Do you wake up every morning and have a hard time getting out of bed? And when you do finally start working, you just can’t focus so you don’t get much done? It’s possible to stop being so lazy when you keep working on it to improve.
No one is going to be 100% productive all the time, but there are very easy ways to significantly improve your productivity and time management with small changes.
Learn 8 simple ways to stop being a coach potato!
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1. Prepare the day or night before.
It’s difficult to have a productive day when you have no idea what is supposed to get done when you wake up. Don’t waste time planning in the morning when you could have spent 10 – 30 mins planning the day before.
Your checklist:
- Clean your workspace and room
- Create a checklist of things that need to be done tomorrow (max 3 – 5 action items)
- Have a healthy dinner at least three hours before you go to sleep
- Don’t eat a bunch of fatty or sugary foods before bed
- Avoid caffeine later in the day
- Prepare your snacks and lunchbox for tomorrow
2. Have a consistent morning routine.
Wake up early and spend the first hour getting ready for the day with no technology. Don’t reach for your phone until after you feel more awake and not lazy. Keep anything that makes you feel lazy away from you until you are more productive.
Even then, make sure to keep your distractions limited throughout the day. Set a time limit for surfing on the web and social media. If you do not have time limits for things that distract you, you will continue to just sit around and scroll on them endlessly.
I cannot stop being so lazy when I don’t have a system set in place everyday. Write down your morning routine for the best productivity and make edits when it doesn’t work out as planned.
My morning routine:
- Wake up and open the blinds
- Water the plants
- Drink a cup of water and then have coffee or tea
- Eat a nutritious breakfast
- Take a shower and get dressed
- Wash face, brush hair and teeth
- Open up your planner or digital task manager to see the top tasks
- Get your most favorite task done first for encouragement.
- Then work on your most difficult task.
- Repeat back and forth between easy and difficult tasks to not get burnt out.
3. When you take a break, make sure to stretch, exercise, or go for a walk.
Most of the time when I was working a full-time job that was super tiring and I was lazy, I would go hiking up the nearby hill. It was nice to get out of the draining workplace and go into an environment that was more uplifting and beautiful.
The best time to exercise or stretch is whenever you feel lazy. For me, I start to feel lazy in the early afternoon, so that is when I take my short break. If it gets boring and too repetitive, try doing new things during your exercise routine or walk.
I would go a different pathway while walking or sit down, observing the nature while taking notes. For exercise, there are different workouts you can do to increase your productivity.
If you need some quick ways to feel motivated again, you can try these habits out.
4. Make your workspace minimal and organized.
The fewer distractions you have on your desk, the more likely you will stop being so lazy. That means not having your cellphone out and put on silence. Also, have a desk with only a few items on it.
The items that you need and probably one or two things that make you happy, but are not distracting to your daily routine. If you work from home, never work on your bed because you won’t be able to switch off your laziness to start focusing on work.
Your bed is a place where you sleep and if you work from there, you will feel like taking a nap at random times. This was something that I struggled with and became more productive when I made myself sit at my desk only when I was working.
5. Add a few plants to your desk.
This is something that I started doing at the start of the pandemic and it works wonders! Having a few colorful plants made me feel happier and love my workspace more. Plants can also make the air cleaner.
Start small because taking care of plants can be hard for beginners. Eventually, you can have your own mini-garden. But you’ll want to study up on how to prevent insects from entering. Plants do attract annoying critters like spiders and gnats.
I find succulents attract fewer bugs because they need less watering. The more water a plant needs, the more flies it attracts. They love the moistness of the plant and reproduce on them.
If you can’t have plants, using some essential oils helps improve the smell of your desk too. View some blend recipes here.
Some plants that are easy to take care of:
- Succulents
- Lucky Bamboo
- Mini Roses
6. Start eating healthier meals and snacks
Do you have an issue of eating out a lot when you’re at work? Do you constantly get take out food and unhealthy snacks to eat throughout the day? That is a huge reason as to why you could be feeling so lazy!
Fatty foods doesn’t offer you that long-term fuel you need to get through the day. Try to replace it with great tasting, nutritious food. There’s no excuse if you don’t like eating fruits and veggies. There’s always recipes to make them taste better.
When you eat out less and start making your own food, it will help you to cut out a lot of those fatty, highly processed foods that make you so tired. Eating good food that will get you through the day is so important to stop being so lazy.
Super Foods you should try to include in your diet:
- Blueberries
- Bananas
- Nuts (Almonds, Walnuts, pecans, etc.)
- Eggs
- Salmon or Tuna
- Kale or Spinach
- Avocados
- Sweet Potatoes
- Smoothies
- Green Tea
- Water
- Vitamins
- Dark Chocolate
7. Listen to instrumentals or nature sounds
There’s a ton of Spotify or YouTube channels that offer calming music to listen to. If you have a noisy environment and want to drown it out, this might be a good option. It’s also good for if you don’t like complete silence.
I like to use my noise-cancelling headphones and then I can barely hear anything around me.
Some great music for focus:
- Classical
- Jazz
- Bossanova
Some amazing sounds for concentration:
- Birds chirping
- River or ocean sounds
- Cafe or Bookstore
8. Use some of the best apps for productivity
There’s so many cool apps out there that can help you in all areas of your productivity from organizing your tasks to improving your diet. Find out what you need and look for apps that help you in those areas.
Here are some ideas:
- Forest – Stay Focused (Helps to prevent you from staying on your phone)
- Trello (To-Do List integration with the desktop version)
- Calm (Guided Meditation App for breaks with nature sounds)
- Mealime (Easy Meal Planner with simple recipes and grocery list)
- Workout For Women (Easy daily guided workouts with plans)
What are some ways that help you to stop being so lazy?
