The 10-Minute Rule That Makes Hard Work Feel Like TikTok

Summary

The video discusses the concept of 'flow state', a psychological state of complete immersion and laser focus that leads to enhanced productivity and creativity. It contrasts flow state with wasted time on unproductive activities like social media, explaining how the same brain mechanisms of 'effortless exertion' underpin both. The speaker advocates becoming a 'temporal architect' by pre-planning time allocations and tracking time usage. This intentionality around time boosts flow, prevents procrastination, reveals shocking realities about time waste, and ultimately allows you to reclaim control of this precious and limited resource.

Takeaways

• 😯 Effortless exertion allows us to be highly productive or entirely unproductive depending on the activity
• 😵 Our perception of time is often inaccurate, making it difficult to properly allocate time
• 📝 Time tracking sets clear goals, fights the feeling of lack of progress, and makes all time investments feel worthwhile
• 📅 Becoming a temporal architect involves pre-determining time allocation, creating calendars for each life area, and retroactively logging all time
• ⏱ The more time tracking leads to intentionality momentum in being productive
• 📈 With visibility into time spending, you discover vast amounts of time wasted on low leverage activities
• 🕰 Time tracking exposes the hard truth of how you allocate your irreplaceable lifetime
• ⌛ Effortless exertion feels easy but is actually fatiguing, causing time slippage
• ⏳ Not tracking your own time prevents you from properly allocating your life's time
• 🏋️‍♀️ Active recovery activities like exercise let you do more high leverage activities

Q & A

What is effortless exertion and how does it relate to flow state?

Effortless exertion is a core characteristic of flow state where individuals experience intense focus and immersion in an activity, leading to high productivity and creativity. It feels effortless due to transient hypofrontality - the temporary deactivation of the prefrontal cortex that usually tracks effort and time.

Why can effortless exertion happen in unproductive activities like gaming or scrolling?

The same mechanisms of transient hypofrontality and reduced self-focus that enable effortless exertion in productive flow states also allow us to immerse in unproductive activities that sap energy and time despite feeling effortless.

How can you become a temporal architect to control flow and effortless exertion?

A temporal architect has awareness of time spent and intentionally allocates time in advance with calendar blocking. This prevents time slippage into unproductive activities and enables flow state immersion in priority tasks.

How does time tracking boost productivity and flow state?

Time tracking sets clear goals, highlights small wins, and increases perceived control over time - all triggers of flow state. Tracking also builds momentum and intentionality, making it easier to persist in productive behaviors.

Why track time manually instead of using automation apps?

Manual time tracking builds the intentionality and mindset shift required to become aware of and take control over your time allocation. This can't be automated or delegated.

What are the four archetypes of time allocation?

The hustler - high execution, no flow, some waste; the sloth - minimal execution, no flow, high waste; the workplace Olympian - medium execution, high flow, no waste; and balanced.

How does time tracking change your perception of intimidating goals?

By revealing how much time tasks actually take, time tracking makes big goals seem more achievable. Forecasting prevents procrastination and you can calmly persist knowing a task's required time.

How does tracking time create momentum?

Seeing progress towards goals builds momentum to keep investing in them. The intentionality also reduces likelihood of self-distraction. It's like a flywheel compounding intentional behaviors.

Why is it important to track ALL your time, even basic activities?

Comprehensive time tracking exposes wasted time you may not realize, highlights tiny wins, and builds full awareness of where irreplaceable moments of life are spent.

How can you optimize when you work based on biology?

Identify your Peak Performance window coded into your daily biology and protect that time for intense focus work to tap into optimal energy and flow state.

Outlines

00:00

😲Our brains can hyperfocus but struggle with focus

The speaker wondered why we can easily binge shows or scroll feeds for hours but struggle to focus for minutes on priorities. Research reveals it's because activities like gaming or public speaking tap into 'flow states', characterized by complete immersion, fluidity between mind and body, and peaks of productivity and creativity.

05:01

😵‍💫 Our perception of time spent is shockingly inaccurate

We underestimate time slippage between our intentions and actions. Unlike money which gets logged, time doesn't by default. So we can unknowingly misallocate entire lifetimes, wondering why we're unhappy or goals aren't materializing. Tracking time exposes the hard truth of where precious moments go.

10:02

📝 Become a 'temporal architect' to take control

To minimize time slippage into unproductive activities, become a 'temporal architect' with near complete awareness of time spent. Calendar block your ideal recurring events first. Then retroactively fill in everything you actually did to backtrack all 24 hours. Assign categories to visually see where time goes.

15:03

🔬 Analyze patterns between execution, flow, junk and off time

When tracking time, categories emerge: execution time to advance goals, flow time for exponential productivity, junk time that is unproductive and off time that is fulfilling. Aim to reduce junk time to 0% and achieve 50% flow time daily like high performers.

20:04

⚡️ Harness momentum from time tracking for compound progress

Beyond forecasting and planning better, tracking time increases intentionality across life. Just as a great workout prevents likelihood of later bingeing, productive flow sessions prevent aimless scrolling. Earlier efforts compound to boost subsequent ones through momentum.

Keywords

💡effortless exertion

A state of complete focus and immersion in an activity, where the sense of effort required seems to disappear. This allows activities like gaming, public speaking, or climbing to be done for hours without fatigue. However, effortless exertion can also lead to wasted time on unproductive activities.

💡flow state

A psychological state characterized by complete absorption in an activity, feelings of energized focus and enjoyment, and enhanced performance. Effortless exertion is a key characteristic of flow state.

💡transient hypofrontality

The temporary deactivation of the prefrontal cortex region of the brain. This diminishes our sense of self and perception of time, contributing to the feeling of effortlessness.

💡temporal architect

Someone with exceptional awareness and control over how they spend their time. Temporal architects meticulously track and allocate their time to avoid wasting it on unproductive activities.

💡time slippage

The phenomenon where time seems to 'slip away' due to spending it on unproductive things that feel effortless, but actually drain energy. This leaves less time for important priorities.

💡intentionality

Deliberateness and conscious choice over one's use of time. Tracking time increases intentionality, making it less likely to waste time due to habits, distraction, or procrastination.

💡momentum

The tendency to continue behaviors once initiated. When you build momentum by tracking time and working intentionally, it propels continued progress due to heightened motivation and activation.

💡peak performance window

The time period each day when our mental and physical energy levels are optimized for productivity. Identifying and working during this window allows greater access to flow state.

💡temporal logging

Retroactively tracking how time was spent after the fact. More sustainable than constant real-time tracking. Involves logging all time usage including recurring events.

💡exponential productivity

The vastly amplified performance and output that can occur in flow state. Harnessing even small amounts of time in flow can massively boost goals compared to consistent incremental progress.

Highlights

Effortless exertion is a core characteristic of flow, a state of complete immersion and focus in an activity.

Part of why effortless exertion occurs is due to transient hypofrontality, the temporary deactivation of the prefrontal cortex, which is integral in constructing our sense of self.

With less prefrontal cortex activity, there's a temporary diminishment in the sense of self, contributing to the feeling of effortlessness.

Challenge-skills balance is a key trigger of flow - the more skill you have, the more challenges you can take on and experience flow within.

By tracking time, you set clear goals, a target for your attention to plunge you into flow and shorten the struggle phase.

Time tracking fights the feeling you aren't making progress by framing work in small wins, making any time put in feel worthwhile.

By pre-allocating time blocks for key activities, you reduce time slippage and ensure those activities actually happen.

Retroactive time logging enables effortless time tracking without needing to constantly monitor and record activities.

Assign colors to time categories so you can visually scan your calendar and quickly grasp time allocation.

Time tracking boosts intentionality across life, making you less prone to procrastination and wasting time.

Momentum from earlier efforts compounds, so tracking time creates a flywheel effect boosting subsequent progress.

By tracking time, you can better forecast how long projects will take, preventing procrastination.

Accurate time tracking exposes the hard truth of how you are spending your irreplaceable moments of existence.

Time is the ultimate scarce resource - tracking it allows conscious decisions about this precious, non-renewable resource.

Find your daily peak performance window coded into your biology to compound productivity from time tracking.

Transcripts

why is it that we can scroll social

media play video games for hours without

trying but struggle to focus even

minutes on our most important priorities

science shows there's an easy way to

solve this so that you can consistently

allocate your time to what you know is

most important and make doing hard work

feel like scrolling Tik Tok now I'm R

darus co-founder and CEO of the flow

research Collective along with my

partner Steven Cotler we taught

thousands of professionals how to access

flow States at will why is it that video

Gamers can easily spend 16-hour days

solving What in reality are incredibly

complex problems in the 2019 fortnite

World Cup bugga then 16 years old

triumphed over 40 million competitors

worldwide winning millions of dollars

professional Gamers can experience

stress levels akin to professional

athletes with heart ratees spiking to

160 or 180 beats per minute making up to

400 movements per minute on the keyboard

and mouse the cognitive demands are

intense how can rock climbers spend day

after day pushing their bodies to their

limits in pure Bliss take the case of

Alex honold for 4 hours he climbed 3,000

ft up sheer Granite without ropes or

safety gear just his hands and feet on

the bare rock face one of the greatest

athletic Feats of any kind how can some

preachers pastors public speakers and

seminar facilitators give hours and

hours of intense presentation with no

sense of grind some speakers are even

known to burn up to 11,000 calories per

day the equivalent of running three

marathons consider Martin Luther King Jr

during the Civil Rights Movement he

frequently spoke for hours all under the

high pressure context of social change

in front of restless crowds it's easy to

assume that all of these people are

genetic mutants what's actually

happening here is a phenomenon known as

effortless exertion effortless exertion

is a core characteristic of a

psychological State called flow a

concept introduced by psychologist Mii

jihi describes a state of complete

immersion and focus in an activity when

in flow individuals experience a sense

of fluidity between their body and mind

often leading to high levels of

productivity and creativity part of the

reason why effortless exertion occurs is

due to a phenomenon called transient

hypofrontality the temporary

deactivation of the prefrontal cortex

prefrontal cortex is integral in

constructing our sense of self it helps

us track the passage of time plan for

the future reflect on the past and

integrate both to form a narrative of

Self in the present with the prefrontal

cortex less active there's a temporary

diminishment in the sense of self this

reduction in self focus contributes to

the feeling of effortlessness in a way

the is no self to be aware of the effort

being exerted leading to an altered

perception of time where hours can pass

by and would feel like minutes making

challenging tasks feel easier and more

enjoyable this is how rock climbers

speakers writers and programmers can do

incredibly complex and demanding work

for hours on end without any signs of

slowing down but here's the thing what

effortless exertion is one of the things

that makes flow formidable for

productivity and performance effortless

exertion can also happen in wildly

unproductive activities like scrolling

social media playing video games or

binging a crime series on Netflix though

being immersed in work and social media

scrolling are dramatically different

activities especially in the results

they can produce the uniting feature

between Flow State and things like

social media scrolling is effortless

exertion the same mechanisms that can

drive Peak Performance can just as

easily evaporate your time this means

effortless exertion is both a superpower

and a liability it depends on what

activity you find this effortless

exertion within and here's something

critical to keep in mind about

effortless exertion even though the

exertion feels effortless it's actually

fatiguing that means there's a double

downside you don't notice the exertion

and yet it fatigues you so you end up

evaporating time while depleting your

physiology it's similar to how you can

increase your calorie load effortlessly

without feeling full by drinking soda or

how you can effortlessly ACR credit card

debt with small purchases and this

results in time slippage time slippage

occurs when we waste our time on

unproductive stuff that feels effortless

but actually fatigues us leaving us with

less to give to our goals and no no

neurochemical resources left to get into

flow so how do you minimize time

slippage the degree to which effortless

exertion saps your time through

liabilities while maximizing effortless

exertion on the things that are

productive well one year on a flight

back from Ireland to the US I was

looking at my journal from the previous

year what I saw emphasized again and

again was how important and high

leverage it would have been to have

recruited a CMO that year I knew that

the company depended on Landing a

qualified CMO before our Rivals did for

every hour I wasn't in investing in

finding this person top-notch candidates

would get scooped up and competitors

gain that Advantage I knew all of it and

yet when I looked at my calendar from

the past year I saw something shocking I

spent two hours a week at the most on

activities related to finding

interviewing and vetting a CMO the gap

between what I flagged as being hugely

important and how I actually spent my

time was appalling this time slippage

feels like a shocking punch to the gut

to find out the reality of how you spend

your time and what you deem is important

on route to achieving big goals we often

think we don't have enough time but

really due to time slippage we're just

grossly underestimating how inaccurate

our perception of time is and how we

allocate it you know how when you send

someone a venmo or you get money in your

bank account it's logged and calculated

automatically well unlike money by

default time doesn't get logged it's not

calculated unless you calculate it this

makes it more difficult to allocate as a

result by default we're so bad at

allocating time that if it were money we

would be doing the equivalent of go into

future threatening death time slippage

isn't something you can fix entirely

rather you must continuously assess the

gap between your intentions and time

allocation to prevent time slippage and

the way to do this is to become a

temporal architect a temporal architect

is someone with near complete awareness

of how they spend their time like a

meticulous accountant who knows exactly

where every penny is spent because they

know how they spend their time they have

complete control over where their time

is allocated most of all the temporal

architect sets the future in motion by

allocating their time time usage in

advance this allows you to become the

puppet master of your future self by

becoming a temporal architect you can

leverage effortless exertion and flow

for productive tasks and masterfully

avoid the unproductive Dark Side of

effortless exertion how do you become a

temporal architect well the solution is

deceptively simple time tracking we'll

cover the specifics on how to track your

time effectively in a moment but first

is it really possible that something as

simple as time tracking can give you

more flow accelerate you towards your

goals and increase performance well

let's look at the science time tracking

boosts flow in a few key ways first one

of flow's key triggers is clear goals

clear goals refers to an action to take

not an outcome to achieve and when you

track your time you're almost always

logging actions not outcomes as a

temporal architect the very Act of

logging what you are about to allocate

your time to explicitly sets a clear

goal a target for your attention which

will plunge you into flow day it only

takes 30 seconds and it often shortens

the struggle phase of the flow cycle we

enter the struggle phase at the very

beginning of a task and due to the surge

of squirmy neurochemistry like cortisol

it tends to be hard to persist and stay

focused we resist it and our attention

gets pulled elsewhere however if we stay

locked into the task we'll soon release

and pop into Flow by setting a clear

goal instead of having to slog for at

least 15 minutes before going deep with

a task the struggle Fades fast and you

drop into flow fueled by effortless

exertion applied to productive

activities time tracking also fights

against the feeling that you aren't

making progress or getting work done it

removes black or white thinking around

work rather than think I haven't been

able to work on the book I'm writing all

day and it's already 6 p.m. so why

bother it allows you to think in terms

of small incremental wins and it

heightens the value of any amount of

time you put in I got 30 minutes in on

the book I'm writing today yesterday and

the day before that it adds up and is

worthwhile it's similar to tracking

money you might think oh it's only $50

why bother but when you save invest it

and track it you see how it grows by

some percentage through interest

compounding year after year which makes

even the incremental small movements or

wins more worthwhile now here's the

thing the average knowledge worker

doesn't track their time and those who

do track it do it in a way that's not

optimal or they rely on software like

rescue time and screen time to do it for

them which as you'll see based on the

science actually defeats the purpose of

tracking your time in the first place so

now how do you actually track your time

well let's break down the specifics of

how to become a temporal architect the

first thing we got to do is to predeter

the allocation of our time out into the

future at this stage you preset chunks

of your day and week in a one-off

fashion such that you don't have to

repeatedly think about when and how to

do what the idea here is to turn your

calendar into a liberating constraint

rigidity in one area for flexibility in

another that matters more it's a way to

Outsource your time to the smartest

version of yourself and become your own

puppet master here's how to set it up do

this when you are in a prime stake your

mind is sharp and you have plenty of

time perhaps on a Sunday when you have

some unhurried quiet hours first zoom

out architect what day and ideal

allocation of your time would be shape

your schedule around how you'd like the

day to unfold then set up recurring

events for these high priority

activities then lock them into your

calendar protect that time from meetings

and distractions include buffers to

mitigate rushing which can block flow

the more recurrent events you lock in

the more you'll boost your sense of

control over your time this is a key

part of becoming a temporal architect to

Step One Define your categories set up

recurring events in your calendar unlike

most approaches to time tracking as a Al

architect you track your time 24/7

including sleep start by listing

activities you do regularly such as

sleep workouts meals and recurring

meetings or calls anything that you do

daily or weekly on a recurring basis

then in your digital calendar like

Google Calendar apple or Outlook create

blocks for these activities for example

if you sleep from 11:00 p.m. to 6:00

a.m. block this time daily do the same

for all recurring events including all

of the repeated productive activities

you want to experience effortless

exertion within this this step ensures

that routine activities are pre-t trck

so require less time to track everything

else step two is to create a calendar

for every category of time most calendar

apps come with basic categories like

work and home for Peak Performance and

flow you'll need more aligning with the

research on Peak Performance and

positive psychology done by the likes of

mihi chick semii Martin saligman and

Steven Cutler you'll want to create

calendars for each of these key areas

the first category is work and

professional tasks you want to divide

this into three simple subcategories

1,000 which is the highest value thing

you can be doing denoting $1,000

activity 100 which is a $100 an hour

task and 10 which is a $10 an hour task

the next category is active recovery or

capacity expansion active recovery

involves some activity designed to

reduce alast static load activate the

parasympathetic nervous system and

replenish the expensive neurochemistry

used up in flow States this includes

things like exercise SAA hiking or a

cold shower and the way you want to

think about it is that we're aiming for

as many $11,000 an hour tracked tasks

and then really high quality recovery

track time so that we can do more of

that $11,000 an hour time more

effectively the next category to add is

learning and skill development one of

flow's triggers is the challenge skills

balance the more skill you have the more

challenges you can take on and get into

flow within the next category is

relationships positive social connection

rewires your brain and contributes

significantly to Peak Performance you

may also want to create a calendar for

Junk time unproductive activities like

aimless phone scrolling after you've

created these categories or modified

them to suit your goals and values

assign a unique color to each category

this visual CU will help you quickly

identify as you glance your whole

calendar across a week how you're

spending your time just like that by

creating these calendars and setting

your recurring time allocations of front

you reduce the risk of time slippage you

plan important things blocked in in

advance like a workout instead of

waiting until you feel like doing them

or instead of finding yourself midweek

feeling like you don't have time for a

workout you're plugging holes that would

result in wasted time and Miss tasks for

example if I didn't put my Sunday

planning on the calendar I might end up

skipping it because I feel too busy in

the moment you're also allocating where

you want time to go in the first place

plus even if you don't track the rest of

your time in a given week with these

pre-allocated chunks you still at least

have a good amount of your time

accounted for in advance the next part

of becoming a temporal architect is

simple on top of all the recurring

events we've just set up we want to

track every hour of our time

24/7 indefinitely here's the key what

you were doing here is actually time

logging more than time tracking this

retroactive time logging is what made

time tracking finally doable for me it

doesn't all have to be live because if

it's all live it creates this sense of

having to press Play constantly on your

whole life rather we want to

pre-allocate our time to a certain

extent and then retroactively fill

things in throughout the day after we do

them I was never able to properly track

my time because I would often forget to

start a timer before a task or meeting

or activity so only a few things got

tracked plus i' never track all of the

things things that I didn't think to

track such as sleep chill time and time

spent with friends instead get

retroactive at the end of the day pull

up your calendar because you've already

pre-allocated much of your time due to

the first step you should have plenty of

events already blocked out in your

calendar then delete any past events of

the day that you didn't do or didn't

attend next drag the length of the

calendar Down based on how long it

actually took to do each event or thing

that you did throughout the day IDE down

to about a 15-minute increment the key

is to ensure that there are zero gaps so

you get to the end of the day you look

back a lot of the time is already

accounted for because you've set the

prescheduled events and then you block

out what you did throughout that day

into the rest of your calendar maybe you

had a call with a team member that

wasn't on your calendar you put that in

and if you need to know how long it was

you check your phone and you see that it

was 45 minutes you know that you chilled

out between meetings for 90 minutes in

the middle of the day you block that in

and you write chill time for example so

that the whole day ends up backfilled

retroactively next we want to assign

each event that we have just backfilled

a category based on the C categories we

just set up in the previous step

learning or skill development active

recovery and then for professional tasks

1,000 100 or 10 and again 1,00 110 are

all going to have different colors so

you're very quickly going to be able to

see how productive your day was CU you

want it filled up obviously with, an

hour activities now since every calendar

has a different color as the week goes

by You' be able to see over time how

each day was allocated at a glance and

if you're really serious about

preventing time slippage you can use

toggle for even more visibility toggle

we're not associated with in any way

just to be clear it's just the app I

personally use toggle is available on

desktop and mobile it's a nice tool for

this if you are tracking your time

retroactively you can sync toggle with

your calendar so that all of the events

are pulled in automatically then at the

end of the day you want to pull up the

calendar view and toggle on the right

side you can see all the events of your

calendar for the week and on the other

side you can see all of the events you

logged as actually occurring all you

need to do is copy any events that

actually occurred across into the toggle

calendar and then assign them into a

project. toggle which will give give you

beautiful visualization over time of

where your time has gone you want to

have different calendars for what you're

working on as projects in Togo for

example if you're a marketer you might

have projects like social media campaign

market research and client meetings in

toggo we want to create a new project

for each of these tasks this allows you

to track time spent on individual work

components at the end of the week we

want to use toggle's visualization tools

to see epic daily weekly and monthly

charts a record of how you are actually

spending time across everything if you'd

like to watch a screen share and how to

run this process I've recorded a video

of me running it at the end of an

average workday I walk you through every

step so you can follow along and do it

yourself just click the link in the

description to watch this walk through

for free as you do this you'll start to

notice patterns that fall into four

broad categories a Time first off

there's execution time this is where

you're directly doing the work you're

trying to advance your goals often

handling necessary but not high leverage

tasks then we've got joke time this is

pure waste time spent doing unenjoyable

and unproductive things Doom scrolling

or fixing a broken pipe in your house or

being stuck in a line that we've got off

time this is quality time that is not

intended to be productive just

fulfilling and enjoyable spending time

with family Hobbies then we have flow

time this is time focused on your

highest priorities while tapping into

the enhanced creativity and productivity

of flow it leads to exponential growth

there are four archetypes for how modern

professionals allocate these categories

of time which one do you fall into this

is what the Hustler looks like they

spend about 50% of their time in

execution time where they are

incrementally productive they spend

about 0% of their time in flow time

which is where exponential productivity

these major leaps are made about 40% of

time is allocated to junk time which is

fully unproductive unfulfilling and

drives time slippage however for the

Hustler about 10% is off time which is

either unproductive but fulfilling or

productive active recovery then there's

the archetype of the sloth just 10% of

their time is allocated to execution

time about 0% is allocated to flow time

60% is junk time and 30% is off time

finally there's the workplace Olympian

they spent about 25% on execution time

getting necessary work done they

allocate a full 50% of their time to

flow time where they tap into deep

creativity for exponential performance

and productivity through accessing

states of flow on their highest priority

highest leverage most impactful work

they aim for 0% junk time knowing that

time is the stuff of life and that

there's no reason to squander it and

they spend 25% of their time in off time

largely devoted to active recovery which

is what fuels their performance by

tracking your time you'll quickly

understand which archetype you align

with and which course corrects you into

becoming a workspace Elm now at first it

might feel like a huge hassle to do this

it's easy to think wouldn't I just be

better off getting to work well consider

this tracking your time might take 10

minutes of an 8- hour workday that's

barely 5% of your day if this small

investment makes your day even 5% more

productive it's a win however because of

time tracking and its relationship to

Flow State you'll often work longer than

8 hours spend less than 10 minutes

tracking and gain far more than a 5%

boost in productivity with flow there's

research showing 500% boost in

productivity during time spent in FL

float so time tracking is always worth

it just consider the ratio is it worth

spending 4 years in school for a 50-year

career as a biologist or if you're going

to do a job for 5 years would you spend

a month being on board of course you

would well you see a similar ratio here

on the daily with the time you spend

tracking your time versus the time you

spend working or living out the rest of

your life you might also think can I

just use apps like rescue time to track

my time for me well the thing is for

more flow you can't delegate your time

tracking you have to become a temporal

architect which requires a mindset shift

about how you see and relate to your

time you can't know if your life's time

is properly allocated without

intentionality doing it yourself it's

not even the time tracking itself that

matters so much as the intentionality

the tracking time forces so as you

become a temporal architect you're ready

for some surprising insights for example

specific intimidating projects that you

kept putting off turn out not to need

anywhere near as much time as you

thought once this happens you can spare

yourself the stress and energy and apply

it to the project instead plus clarity

around how long tasks take increase your

sense of control over your time which is

a characteristic of Flow State when you

know certain things just take however

long they take you can set boundaries

and calmly sink into the task fully

focused and ready for Flow State with

visibility over how you spend your time

it becomes clear that despite feeling

time pressure it turns out you have

plenty of it it's just misapplied the

discovery of how much clock time is

being drained on low leverage lowf flow

activities is a shock to the system but

on the other side of this shock is

Liberation when you track your time you

also to increase your intentional across

all areas of life intentionality and

self-distraction have a seesaw

relationship the higher the

intentionality the less likely you are

to procrastinate or squander time on N

for example it's rare to do a great

workout and then binge eat that day

similarly it's rare to track time do a

great flow session and then check

Instagram 5 minutes later in behavioral

psychology this is called momentum which

refers to the increased likelihood of

continuing in Behavior after it's been

initiated if you gain momentum with task

a the momentum built spills over into

task B enhancing your performance due to

the mental and physical activation from

the first task they're like a flywheel

of increased intentionality earlier

efforts compound boosting subsequent

progress you take advantage of this

intentionality when you track your time

not just intraday but week after week

when you see that you're allocating a

lot of time toward your goals the

momentum propels you to continue

investing in those goals the flywheel

spins faster and when you track your

time you also get better at forecasting

you can better scope out a project and

Advance because you know how long

specific actions tend to take this

increases your sense of control over

your time and in turn your selfefficacy

which boosts your flow proness best of

all accurate forecasting prevents

procrastination you turn what was once

intimidating into something bound to a

clear and comforting set of minutes or

hours required to complete in short you

can track your time to reclaim your time

not just now but for the future imagine

you go to the doctor for a routine

checkup and they discover something

seriously wrong the prognosis you have

one week left to live where would your

mind immediately go if you're like most

it would go to how will I spend the

remaining time that I have left on this

Earth in this body with this Human

Experience you would suddenly become

radically conscious about your time

allocation knowing that each remaining

moment is indescribably precious of

course you don't actually die next week

we hope but the reality is you will die

someday and all of life is time of that

value every day that passes is gone

forever so how do you choose to spend

that non-renewable resource and how much

attention do you actually pay to it it's

the stuff that life is made of yet we

tend to pay very little attention to how

we use it without time tracking you

could be unknowingly misallocating your

entire life wondering why you aren't as

happy as you could be why you're tired

all the time or why your goals aren't

materializing with time tracking exposes

the hard truth of where your

Irreplaceable moments of existence are

allocated as the Godfather of flow

psychologist mihigh jmih High put it

time is the ultimate scarce resource we

have over the years the content of

experience will determine the quality of

life therefore one of the most essential

decisions any of us can make is about

how one's time is allocated or invested

now if you want to compound the flow and

productivity you get from time tracking

you can make sure you're working during

the time your physiological resources at

their Peak we each have a daily Peak

Performance window coded into our

biology to find out how to harness yours

click the video on screen