Make overwhelming tasks affordable: 10 minutes a day

There is one productivity trick, which you can apply in many different occasions: I call it “10 minutes a day”. It is so simple that it is almost ridiculous: take a task that feels overwhelming and dedicate just 10 minutes a day to it. The amount of time is just an orientation, there is nothing magic about the number 10. Take what feels good for you.

Here are some examples for applications:

• Learning music, a language, touch-typing.
• Getting a messy desk/room/flat/… under control.
• Overcoming light depression (10 minutes a day of movement, of social life, of caring for yourself).
• Making sport (I go jogging for about 15 minutes each time).
• Writing a project, businessplan, dissertation, article.

10 minutes activity are never overwhelming
You can always find 10 free minutes in a day and most times they feel like a short period of time. The magic of this trick relies on the lack of pressure. Make the goal smaller until you get to be the boss, not it. Pull the threshold down until you can get into action effortlessly. Why make it more difficult than necessary?

You can do a lot in 10 minutes
If you don’t believe it, set a timer and wait 10 minutes until it rings. Now, are 10 minutes long or not? In moments of hard procrastination force yourself to stay 10 minutes long concentrated on a task no matter what is the outcome. How many times do you have to stop yourself from looking up emails, get a coffee, talk with your colleagues etc.?

For many things, 10 minutes a day are enough
For many things, 10 minutes a day are even better than two hours a week in a block (think of learning an instrument or a language) and in any case 10 minutes are always more than zero minutes.

10 minutes can be the beginning of half an hour, an hour, two hours…
The most important part is to really feel good about having made the 10 minutes. Feel free, however, to continue with what you are doing if you feel like it and have the time.

Know at last what to do with those stupid 10 minutes in between!
Of course, sometimes you need them to fall on the sofa, close your eyes in between and relax, but it is also nice to have some default activity to take advantage of for example waiting time. Sometimes when I was at home waiting for someone who would come in ten minutes I grabbed my flute and started playing scales. In the end, if the person came for example 20 minutes late I ended up playing for half an hour instead of just waiting and getting impatient. If I had settled for half an hour and thought that less than that was not even worth it I wouldn’t have even started!

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