Leverage Your Energy Cycles for Greater Productivity

How to Get More Done Doing The Right Things at the Right Time 

Today, I want to look at ways you can leverage your energy cycles to improve your productivity. Let’s find your most productive times to work and then talk about the most effective things you could be spending your time on during challenging times.

Learning to identify the hours when you’re most and least productive can help you arrange your workday to accomplish vital tasks when your energy is high and save the more menial or administrative matters when you’re not as focused and efficient. When you learn to work with your peak energy/focus times rather than against them, you will feel as though you’re moving with the flow, and the current is actually carrying you through some of your tasks for the day—even tasks you might ordinarily procrastinate. 

How Do You Identify Peaks and Valleys in Your Energy and Focus?

The first step in understanding your peak energy and focus times of day is to observe yourself as you go about your day. When do you feel more creative, energized, and ready to go? When do you need to schedule some downtime to regroup? 

Do you crawl out of bed and drag yourself straight to the coffee, needing some time to wake up slowly? Or do you hop out of bed full of energy and ready to tackle your day? 

Maybe you catch your second wind around 9 or 10 pm and feel your most creative late at night, or you’re practically brain-dead by 8 pm, ready to brush your teeth and call it a night. 

“I am both a night owl and an early bird. So I am wise and I have worms.” 

— Michael Scott 

Most people know whether they’re an early bird or a night owl, but have you taken a look at your productivity throughout the day? Do you know if you focus best in the morning hours and struggle with an afternoon slump? Or is your slump in the morning hours and by lunchtime you’re just starting to hit your stride? 

If you’ve never paid attention to these peaks and valleys before, start noting how you feel during certain parts of the day using your journal, a notes app on your phone, or the worksheet on the next page of this newsletter. Pay attention to how you feel before and after meals and try to identify when your peak performance times are. 

Most energy spikes last approximately 90 minutes and some people will experience two or three peaks and valleys in a 24-hour period. Once you’ve identified your highs and lows, the key is to tackle the right tasks at the right time to leverage your energy cycles. 

You want to tackle your most demanding tasks during the hours when you have the greatest amount of energy. Then distribute tasks that require less energy during the times when your mental focus is divided and you are more easily distracted. 

Arranging your tasks according to your peaks and valleys will help you accomplish more in the same amount of time while also improving the quality of your work. 

Let’s start charting out how your day is going so you can identify how you can leverage your energy cycles.

Energy & Focus Throughout the Day: 

Early Morning Hours	Late Morning Hours
Did you have anything to eat or drink?	Did you have anything to eat or drink?
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Are you focused or distracted?	Are you focused or distracted?
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Take note of your mood + energy levels.	Take note of your mood + energy levels.
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Is this a peak or a valley?	Is this a peak or a valley?
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Early Afternoon Hours	Late Afternoon Hours
Did you have anything to eat or drink?	Did you have anything to eat or drink?
| | |	| | |
Are you focused or distracted?	Are you focused or distracted?
| | |	| | |
Take note of your mood + energy levels.	Take note of your mood + energy levels.
| | |	| | |
Is this a peak or a valley?	Is this a peak or a valley?
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Evening Hours	Late Afternoon Hours
Did you have anything to eat or drink?	Are you energized or ready for bed?
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Do you love your late hours or do you resent having to work now?	Is this a peak or a valley?
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Activity: Organize the Tasks You Do into 4 Categories: 

Quick wins:​ Tasks that are HIGH impact and LOW effort to complete. Focus your efforts here! These are projects that appeal to your audience and make a big impact on your business but are easy for you to do. 

● Whipping up a cheat sheet, checklist, or worksheet as a lead magnet.

● Hosting a Facebook Live for your Group to share a helpful tip 

Major projects:​ Projects that are HIGH impact and need HIGH effort to complete. These are projects that give good returns but are time-consuming to complete. You’ll want to schedule some peak time to work on these projects each day and week. 

● Creating a digital course or outlining a new workshop to create passive income.

● Making discovery calls with potential clients 

Fill-in tasks: ​Tasks that are LOW impact with LOW effort to complete. These non-money-making, time-consuming tasks don’t move the needle in your business. Delegate these kinds of tasks! 

● Doing your business books 

Thankless tasks: ​Tasks that are LOW impact with HIGH effort to complete. Avoid these tasks. Are they necessary to complete? Can you eliminate or delegate them? 

● Clerical work, managing a cluttered inbox, etc. 

“It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?” 

― Henry David Thoreau

Prioritize Your Tasks to Get More Done! Make a list of all the things you need and want to do for your business and sort them into the four boxes below. This will help you prioritize your tasks so you can leverage your energy cycles and make the biggest impact on your audience and business! 

Quick Wins	Major Projects
High Impact for Your Audience & Business, Low Effort to Complete	High Impact for Your Audience & Business, High Effort to Complete
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Fill-Ins	Thankless Tasks
Low Impact for Your Audience & Business, Low Effort to Complete	Low Impact for Your Audience & Business, High Effort to Complete
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Activity: Identify Productivity Enemies: 

Whether you’re a pro at working from home or this working from home is new to you, there’s no denying that more distractions are surrounding us than ever. Even if we worked from home in the past, it probably wasn’t when everyone else in the family was home. Even if everyone else was home, it’s unlikely that everyone was fighting for bandwidth to do zoom calls with teachers, teammates, and friends.! We have to become fiercely protective of our ability to focus. 

Throughout the next week, notice when you catch yourself unfocused or distracted.

● What were you doing at the time? 

● Can you identify what the distraction was? 

● What can you do to prevent the distraction from happening again? 

Write the distraction down and figure out how to reframe or eliminate it in the future: 

If…	Then…
I got sidetracked from working on my course when the washing machine buzzed.	Stop trying to multitask. Save laundry for the weekend or evening.
I fell into a rabbit hole when I was on social media.	Set a timer, hire a social media assistant, or save social media for the end of the day.
I got distracted listening to the kids bake cookies in the kitchen.	Work with noise-canceling earbuds while listening to some quiet music.
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Managing Your Focus When Stressed 

When you leverage your energy cycles, you match the right task to the right time. So, you want to make sure you’re focusing on the RIGHT things in your business. During times of stress, prioritizing what’s important becomes more difficult. Frankly, it’s harder to focus when you’re feeling overwhelmed.

Entrepreneur Magazine has a great article on prioritizing and focusing when you’re overwhelmed. You can read the whole thing here​, but I’ll summarize it below. 

1. Give yourself some extra grace. Don’t beat yourself up for feeling overwhelmed, especially during high stress. 

2. Write it all down. Grab a journal and a pen and set a timer for 5 minutes. Write down everything and anything that comes to mind that’s stressing you out, things you need to remember to do, what you are afraid of, etc. 

3. Take a break. Read a book. Listen to some music. Dance. Meditate. Take a 20-minute nap. You’ll feel better, and you’ll be able to focus more when you take frequent breaks. 

4. Prioritize your tasks. Use the priority matrix above and sort what you need to do into the four categories. 

5. Laugh. Laughter is an excellent way to release worry and stress pressure valve! Call a funny friend, watch your favorite comedian on YouTube, or play with your pet. 

6. Exercise. Go for a walk, even if you can only walk around your house. If you can’t go outside, climb the stairs, do 20 squats, and stretch your body. 

7. Put it in perspective. Identify what you’re feeling stressed about. Is it really a threat? In some situations (such as the case with severe illness), you may be facing a real threat to you or someone you love. If that’s the case, lean on the people around you and your faith to help you get through it. For most people, though, there is no real threat. We may be worried about what could happen, stressing over a particular project or finances. Remember that this is a temporary situation. It will pass. The sun will shine again. 

After you’ve worked through the seven steps above and are in a better place emotionally to work, take a look at your prioritized list of things to do. It should mostly contain money-making activities or activities that will move your business towards your goals. If it doesn’t, figure out what you can delegate or eliminate. Narrow the list down to only the things you can do and then leverage your energy cycles to maximize your potential.

Here’s a Quick List of Things to Work on Related to Marketing 

1. Nurturing Your Paying Clients—It’s always easier to keep a happy client happy than to go out and get a new client. 

2. Nurturing Your Email List —Your subscribers joined your list because they have a problem and want your help to solve it. Don’t abandon them because you’re under stress. Keep emailing them and doing your thing. Many people are still buying. 

3. Grow Your Email List​—There are many ways to “get paid,” and collecting an email in exchange for a free gift is a form of payment.​ Growing an email list​ is an activity that can directly increase revenue and improve other areas of your business. 

4. Streamline Your Processes​—Automate any of the repetitive tasks in your business that you can. 

5. Create New Programs & Services—Does your audience need something different now that the world is in pain? Have they been watching their retirement evaporate? Are they struggling to get sales? Create an “Acute Care” or “Triage” package to offer them!