This week I had record low productivity and on Thursday I decided to do my tax returns. It was a task I had been putting off forever, just devastated at the idea of going through meaningless documents. After getting through this disgusting task, everything else seemed so much more exciting. And I was productive for the remaining week. And how the fuck did that happen?

When you hit low productivity for a while, you will fail to boost productivity by trying to boost productivity. I know if it sounds counter-intuitive. I think a good metaphor could be sleeping. When you cannot fall asleep, the immediate reaction is trying to sleep. This is the intuitive reaction but putting in the effort to sleep results in stress. Stress leads to low productivity of tasks that require focus. Low productivity leads to stress. So if you have been stuck in low productivity, we can assume that one would already be stressed. Trying to be productive would lead to a similar result as trying to fall asleep. It would cause more stress which would drain out productivity. So, fighting low productivity can be translated to a problem of how to deal with stress.

One simple way to deal with stress is to relieve stress. We have to acknowledge which level of stress we are at to relieve stress. We often make the mistake of performing a task when we are too stressed already. This is why we drive under fatigue or go to the library to end up not doing any real work. A friend of mine always took a day off per week. Even when she felt she had the energy to do more work, she would make her best effort to not do anything related to work one day per week. I believe this was one of the simplest and most efficient means to keep stress under threshold. When I feel unproductive I either go straight to sleep if it is past 10 p.m. or take the day off. If I can I try to do something to actively relieve stress. Actively relieving stress are activities that I do not do on normal days after work. Social media would fall into passively relieving stress. Going to an exhibition would be actively relieving stress. Similar to working, you can relieve much more stress if you do it the right way than unconsciously do it. Acknowledge your stress and relieve it well.

Another way to fight stress has something to do with human psychology. Human stress level is relative and this has been proven in many experiments. A representative one is the study on colonoscopy by Kahneman, a Nobel prize winning psychologist. The study shows that stress levels are determined by the most intense amount of stress during the operation and the level of pain towards the end of operation. We all have errands or duties that we have been postponing simply because we absolutely did not want to do them. For me, these are visiting the dentist, going through my tax return files, meeting someone I really did not want to meet, etc. Do one of these tasks. After suffering from the pain of completing these tasks, you will recognize how exciting everything else is and this will boost your productivity. If you find it hard to believe, recall the last time you had to do something and cleaned your room. Remember how fun cleaning your room is? Our level of stress while doing something is relative. Although this might not work for everyone doing something that I have to yet is absolutely disgusting leads me to becoming efficient when I come back to my original work.

When you are not getting shit done, don’t just try to get shit done. Breathe in, breathe out. Meditate. Assess your level of stress, relieve it, and then get shit done.