Presley, Author at Parts with Presley

What You Need to Know About Anger When You’re…

Trump was just re-elected in the United States, and we could be entering an era where the most extreme anti-humanitarian forces in the country run unfettered.

Leftists and liberals are outraged at the people who voted for fascism, misogyny, and white supremacy. Trump voters are often motivated by anger as well. So in order to move forward from here, I think we all need to understand anger better.

Productivity Tips

How to Stop Mindless Scrolling

You swipe upwards and more posts appear: an ad, a meme you’ve already seen, and a question everyone already knows the answer to – posted just to get comments. “I should stop this mindless scrolling and get back to work,” you think.

But deep down, you know that’s impossible. Work feels so daunting right now. You have twelve decisions to make before you can write up this proposal, and you don’t know the answers to any of them.

Scrolling, on the other hand, is easy. It’s so easy it seems like it’s happening without your conscious control. You’re just watching your thumb flick and new images appear. Will you find something to make you feel better?

Not exactly: it’s a post about politics saying exactly what you disagree with. It’s wrong in so many ways at once that your counterarguments have a traffic jam on the way out of your mouth and you’re left speechless. Yeah, this isn’t relaxing anymore.

“If I’m not going to work, I should at least take a walk and get some exercise,” you tell yourself.

But that brings a pang of guilt. How can you leave your desk when you have so much work to do?

The only thing that feels doable right now is to keep scrolling. It solves exactly zero of your problems, but it takes so little energy that you’re stuck there. You’ve fallen into the Guilt Trap.

Productivity Tips

Breaking the “Tomorrow I’ll do it all!” cycle

You had such big plans for today. You were going to get up early, hit the gym, finish that big work project that’s been hanging over your head once and for all, and then knock out all your chores. You might even have time to think of a cure for cancer before getting to bed right on time.

But somehow, it didn’t go that way.

Your inner critic has a lot to say about your day. How could you fall so short? You’ll have to really hustle tomorrow to make up for it. Yes, tomorrow, you’re going to get up early, hit the gym, finish that big work project…wait. I see where this is going.

Getting out of the cycle of disappointing yourself

If you’re going to get out of the loop of setting high expectations, not meeting them, and then raising them even higher, you need to be honest with yourself about what is and isn’t working in your day.

Productivity Insights

The Anti-Capitalist Case for Productivity

I’ve done a lot of anti-capitalist organizing over the years, so it can raise an eyebrow or two when I tell my friends that I’ve become a productivity coach. Have I bought into the idea that your worth is based on how productive you are? Have I sold out and started helping bosses exploit their workers?

Fortunately, the answer is no. I don’t care how many widgets per hour you produce, how much share holder value you create, or what the GDP is. I would love to see a decrease in the standard workweek, an increase in paid leave, and universal benefits good enough that people could survive without a job.

But I also love getting stuff done. And I’m pretty sure everyone does, under the right circumstances.

Productivity Insights

How to Stop Procrastinating

This entry is part 3 of 3 in the series How Procrastination Works

To understand how to stop procrastinating, we need to understand the anatomy of procrastination. And that anatomy is a lot like the anatomy of a weed.

Think of your schedule as a garden. You plant different kinds of activities in it, and some of them bear useful fruit, and others, like pretty flowers, are just enjoyable. Procrastination is like a weed growing in that garden. It steals your time and energy from better pursuits just like weeds steal sunlight and soil nutrients from more desirable plants.

And procrastination has three layers, just like a plant has leaves, stems, and roots. Let’s look at each of these layers to learn how to uproot procrastination.

Productivity Insights

Why You Procrastinate

This entry is part 2 of 3 in the series How Procrastination Works

In order to make time for the things that matter to you most, you need to be able to do the intimidating, boring, and unpleasant tasks on your to do list without wasting hours working up the nerve to do them. You need to be able to get stuff done.

You can think of the process of getting stuff done as a process of driving a car from Ideatown to Accomplishmentville. If you’re procrastinating, you’re not arriving in Accomplishmentville with enough time to park, breathe a contented sigh, and have a night out on the town.

Somewhere along the way, you’re getting stuck or sidetracked.

Productivity Insights

Do You Procrastinate?

This entry is part 1 of 3 in the series How Procrastination Works

Does this sound like you?

You have a flexible work schedule without a boss hovering over you

You might be:

a solopreneur
a freelancer, or
a remote worker

You want to take advantage of this freedom

If you could get your work done efficiently, you would:

grow your business and help more people
spend more quality time with your family and friends
take better care of your body
make incredible art, and/or
spend more time volunteering to make this world less of a dumpster fire

But you can’t seem to stay on task!

Productivity Tips

From Drawing a Blank to Taking Action

One of the most common reasons people put off doing an important task is that they’re not sure how to do it. Sometimes they’re not even sure exactly what they should be doing — they just know they’re supposed to somehow end up with a finished product.

At a recent coworking session, T Carter knew she needed to work on marketing her services. She recently left the corporate world to open her own boutique graphic design business, Design Breakfast.

Confusion breeds procrastination

It was no surprise to me that T was using the coworking session to write marketing content. When you own a small business, there are an infinite number of things you could do for it, and a lot of them are more straightforward than writing content. Writing content is so important, but what kind of content should you write? About what? For whom? It’s so much easier to fiddle with the colors of your website — even if nobody sees your website because you don’t write any marketing content.

This doesn’t just apply to business owners, though. In general, confusion breeds procrastination. The tasks we’re fuzzy on are the ones that need the most attention, but they tend to get the least.

Productivity Tips

How to Approach an Icky Task

Growing up, I always wanted to skip ballet class. And then without fail, I’d feel great afterwards and be glad I had gone.

I haven’t changed much: I still feel like skipping my workouts a lot. (I have an especially tense relationship with Leg Day.) But I do know now that the feeling that I’m going to hate working out is not a reliable predictor of the reality.

So what’s the best way to start doing something that you feel “ugh” about?

Coaching

The difference between coaching and therapy

This entry is part 3 of 4 in the series How to Choose a Coach

The most common question I get is “what is the difference between life coaching and therapy?”

And I’ll answer it, I promise. But unlike most articles on this topic, I want to start by acknowledging that they are similar and explaining why that’s okay.

Convergent evolution of the helping professions

I think it’s a really good sign that some therapists, coaches, and spiritual guides are starting to converge on similar methods and share their modalities with each other. I think that’s happening because we’re finding what works for the human psyche.

Getting out of the cycle of disappointing yourself

Does this sound like you?

You have a flexible work schedule without a boss hovering over you

You want to take advantage of this freedom

But you can’t seem to stay on task!

Confusion breeds procrastination

Convergent evolution of the helping professions

What's Your Procrastination Type?