Productivity

How to End Every Day Feeling Accomplished

It Can Be Done When You Master These 3 Skills

This is a guest post by John Lee Dumas. John is the host of the award-winning Entrepreneur on Fire podcast and creator of The Mastery Journal.

If there’s one thing that has the power to encourage and motivate us unlike anything else, it’s the feeling of accomplishment and the momentum it brings.

It’s a feeling we all want, but one that often eludes us. The busyness of the day takes over, and instead of celebrating the day, proud of what you’ve accomplished, you look back and wonder what exactly you were able to get done.

If this sounds familiar, then you’re not alone. 

The momentum gained from past accomplishment is quickly lost when you go day-after-day seeing (what looks like) a lack of progress.

The good news is, ending every day feeling accomplished is attainable. All it takes is mastering these three skills: productivity, discipline, and focus.

You've likely set a number of big goals for this new year—both personal and professional. Productivity, discipline, and focus are the skills that will help you accomplish those goals and take your business and life to the next level.

Here’s exactly how you can start mastering these three skills today and start ending every day feeling accomplished:

  1. Productivity. It's not enough to just get random things done. You have to accomplish tasks that really matter to you and your business.

    It’s no secret that increasing your productivity will lead to faster results. But how do you actually become more productive? You have to have a plan.

    You may not be a project manager or someone who is great at the details, but that doesn’t mean you can’t take small steps towards increasing your productivity.

    One way to do this is to start planning for your day the night before. Each night before you end your work day simply write down one task or project you must complete the next day that matters to you and your business.

    When you have a plan for exactly what you’ll work on the next day, there’s no wasting time or guessing about how to get started the next morning.

  2. Discipline. Setting and sticking to a plan of action is not easy to do. Distractions, opportunities, shiny objects—they’re everywhere.

    Guess what? Those are all excuses, and it’s time to stop making excuses. It’s up to you to choose. It’s up to you to make the commitment to become more disciplined.

    The first step is to make sure you have a clear picture of what your next most important steps are based on the task or project you’re working on.

    Once you have the next two or three steps laid out, put time deadlines on each of them and hold yourself accountable to staying focused in order to meet those deadlines.

  3. Focus. When I say “focus,” I mean to follow one course until you find success and remain distraction-free in the process.

    If you had to guess, how much focus time do you have throughout any given day? Thirty minutes? Two hours? None?

    Focus time is integral to helping you master productivity and discipline, because without it, no matter how good your plan is or how well you fend off distractions, you’ll end up doing busy work.

    To help you improve your ability to focus on the task or project at hand, use an online timer like e.ggtimer.com.

    Give yourself set time blocks to achieve specific steps in your plan. During these time blocks, do not let anything push you off course. If a distraction pops up or something comes to mind you want to remember, write it down and immediately get back on task.

Ending every day feeling accomplished is something we all strive for. And it's attainable!

I challenge you to never end another day by looking back and wondering what exactly you were able to get done.

Remove busy work from your vocabulary completely. Choose to get rid of all distractions and excuses. Allow productivity, discipline, and focus to take your business and life to the next level.

This is a guest post by John Lee Dumas. John is the host of the award-winning Entrepreneur on Fire podcast and creator of The Mastery Journal.
Which of these three skills do you need to better develop? What will you do to make progress this week?

Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, we will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, we only recommend products or services we use and believe will add value to our readers. We are disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

More In Productivity
Get Weekly Guidance for Free

Subscribe to the Full Focus newsletter for the latest insights and strategies in goal achievement.

Sign Up Now