If you want more – more productivity, income, satisfaction, time – you need to go small and want less.
As the authors put it, “You want fewer distractions and less on your plate. The barrage of e-mails, texts, calls, and meetings keep you from your most important work.
Simultaneous demands of work and family take a toll. What’s the cost? Second-rate work, missed deadlines, smaller paychecks – and lots of stress.”
The book focuses on a few key points, including prioritization, goal setting, and the superiority of single-tasking over multitasking. Most importantly, the book teaches you one of the most powerful questions you can ever ask yourself.
1. Going Small
“When you want the absolute best chance to succeed at anything you want, your approach should always be the same. Go small.
‘Going small’ is ignoring all the things you could do and doing what you should do. It’s recognizing that not all things matter equally and finding the things that matter most.
It’s a tighter way to connect what you do with what you want. It’s realizing that extraordinary results are directly determined by how narrow you can make your focus.”
“When you go as small as possible, you’ll be staring at one thing. And that’s the point.”
Most of us spread ourselves too thin.
The truth is, we have only so much time and energy available to us. If we want the best chances of achieving something meaningful, we need to prioritize: Choose our next domino and give it our full attention.
2. The Domino Effect
The point is: Extraordinary results come from doing one thing at a time.
Success is built sequentially, not simultaneously.
It’s all about lining up the domino, giving it all of our attention, knocking it over, and then lining up the next domino.
One thing at a time. Over a long enough time period, big things will happen.
3. DO list vs Success List
Prioritization, the 80/20 principle, and the idea of success versus to-do lists all come down to this simple truth: Not all activities are equally valuable and not all activities bring about the same rewards.
This goes back to the idea of “being busy versus being productive.”
The prescription is simple. Focus on the few things that truly matter. Identify the 20% that create 80% of the results. And then take those 20% again and narrow it down even further – until, ultimately, you have one domino to focus on. Then, go about knocking over that domino.
4. Juggling is an Illusion
Opposed to popular belief, multitasking doesn’t make you more productive, it makes you less productive. The reason: switching costs.
Every time you switch from one task to another, you need to “forget” about the previous task and activate the rules of the new task.
This may be relatively effortless when the tasks are simple, but not when they are complex.
As researcher David Meyer says, the time costs can range from 25 percent or less to well over 100 percent.
In short: Multitasking leads to mistakes, poor choices, stress, and low productivity
5. The Focusing Question
“The Focusing Question: What’s the ONE THING I can do such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?”
What’s the ONE THING I can do such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?
It’s a magical question for multiple reasons. It forces you to prioritize, focus on one thing, be specific, and it directs you to take action.
6. Specific Uses for the Focusing Question
Here are some Focusing Questions to ask yourself.
Say the category first, then state the question, add a time frame, and end by adding ‘such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?’ For example: ‘For my job, what’s the ONE Thing I can do to ensure I hit my goals this week such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?’”
7. Productivity’s Greatest Power Tool
Whatever it is, you need to block out time for it on your calendar.
If it’s a one-time thing, you block one specific time. If it’s a repeatable, every-day thing, you block it off every day. And once you’ve blocked a specific chunk of time, nothing gets in the way.
Papasan and Keller suggest time blocking three things:
- Your time off
- Your ONE Thing
- Your planning time
You want to go to your calendar and block off large amounts of time for these three activities.
8. Time Block Your Time Off
“Extraordinarily successful people launch their year by taking time out to plan their time off.
Why? They know they’ll need it and they know they’ll be able to afford it.
In truth, the most successful simply see themselves as working between vacations.
On the other hand, the least successful don’t reserve time off, because they don’t think they’ll deserve it or be able to afford it.
By planning your time off in advance, you are, in effect, managing your work time around your downtime instead of the other way around.”
Productivity isn’t about putting in more hours, it’s about getting as much high-value work done in as little time as possible.
Working too many hours only slows you down. As the authors suggest:
Take time off. Block out long vacations and long weekends, then take them. You’ll be less stressed, better rested, more relaxed, and more productive when you come back.
9. Time Block Your ONE Thing
“After you’ve time blocked your time off, time block your ONE Thing.
Yes, you read that right. Your most important work comes second. Why? Because you can’t happily sustain success in your professional life if you neglect your personal ‘re-creation’ time.
Time block your time off, and then make time for your ONE Thing.
The most productive people, the ones who experience extraordinary results, design their days around doing their ONE Thing.
Their most important appointment each day is with themselves, and they never miss it.”
Unless you block time for your #1 high-value activity, you won’t spend nearly enough time on it.
Instead, you’ll end up wasting time on email, social media, meetings, and other low-value activities.
10. The One Thing
“If you try to do everything, you could wind up with nothing. If you try to do just ONE Thing, the right ONE Thing, you could wind up with everything you ever wanted.
The ONE Thing is real. If you put it to work, it will work.
So don’t delay. Ask yourself the question, ‘What’s the ONE Thing I can do right now to start using The ONE Thing in my life such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?’
And make doing the answer your first ONE Thing!”
Those are the last words of the book.
So, what are you waiting for? Start applying what you’ve learned and ask yourself: What’s the ONE Thing I can do right now to start using The ONE Thing in my life such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?
If you wish to read the full article please visit:”https://www.njlifehacks.com/the-one-thing-gary-keller-jay-papasan-summary/”
There are may interesting book reviews on this site: “https://www.njlifehacks.com/category/book-club/“
