vetta project

I am very busy.

I’m perhaps 2 - 3 weeks away from the first draft of my entire PhD thesis. Finally. I’m also learning a lot of mathematical finance. Currently this means 6 hours a day of lectures which consist of endless stochastic calculus. There just aren’t enough hours in the day. So the question is, how can I get more done?

These are my current best ideas, based on self observation of what seems to work for me:

1) Go to sleep early, get up early. For some reason I get more done this way. Indeed, many of the most productive people I know are early risers. I think the reason is that when I get up early I feel ahead of the day, rather than running late. This puts me in the right frame of mind to get things done. The key to making this work is going to sleep early. Then the getting up early is no problem once you’ve had a decent amount of sleep.

2) Meditate for at least 10 minutes every morning upon rising. This period of relaxation also puts me into a get-stuff-done frame of mind. Being more relaxed I’m less tired and have better concentration.

3) Spend a full 5 minutes thinking about what needs to be done and making a list. I do this as soon as I get to my office. I make a list of everything, think about each task for a while and what needs to be done. Then I mark down what I really want to get done from this list today. Again, this puts me into a get-stuff-done frame of mind.

4) Food, water and exercise. If I eat healthy food and get enough liquid to drink each day and exercise a bit a few times a week, I have more energy and it’s much easier to get stuff done.

5) More of less. How much time do you spend on various things, and how much value do these things have to you? As any economist will tell you, their marginal value per hour should all be equal. If not, you can increase your total value by reallocating your time. This requires thought on a regular basis. Note that “value” doesn’t just mean getting more work done. It means what ever is valuable to you.

These are the best 5 things I know of.