A good friend and hero of mine told me this story about productivity. He says he has this recurring dream. When his life has ended and he is called to appear before God and give account for his life. He humbly approaches the creator of the universe and presents to him, three notebooks. Within the first book, smallest of the three, in fact very small he says, contains all the projects and tasks that he successfully completed. A few accomplishments done in obedience, that reflected the nature and glory of God. The second book, quite a bit larger in size, lists all of his failures. From moral failures to relational mishaps, failed business ventures. It's ugly record was all written and being turned over to God.

Lastly there is the third book. This one was more than double the size of the first two books combined. But inside this book, there were neither successes nor failures. For it describes the many times he bailed on an idea or task, never following through. This book lists countless entries of all the times he quit. When he gave up because of internal or external pressures. Whether it was a good idea, God idea, faith or presumption, things he coulda shoulda woulda, but didn't do.

My friend went on to tell me that he sees that these three books are all that he will have to show for his life. And that mastering the ability of being productive and using his time wisely was one of most important thing for him to do.

Nestled in the top left corner of my screen I have the Apimac timer. Sometimes I allow it to remain visible and distracting. But more often, I shield myself from the inevitable by stuffing it behind the windows of Evernote and Pages. From thirty-five down to zero, this self-imposed limitation is narrowing the tenure of my CFT session.

Today I celebrate my fifth consecutive day using this productivity tactic; Critical focus time. Never before have I been able to set the course of my day and follow it according to plan. Client calls and impulsive email checks normally begin a string of tangents that run the course of my day. But I must work my days as best I can according to my plans. Not others.

Critical focus time is a process of setting up small blocks of times where you work on one project without interruptions. Normally between 30 and 45 minutes max. Followed by 15 minutes or so of returning messages or refreshing your mind. This allows enough time to not feel guilty about turning email and phone off, but still allow enough concentrated effort to make a dent on your work. I am continuously coming to realize that I don't need more knowledge, ideas or books to raise the level of my success. I need to master focusing and completing projects efficiently.

Random thought: If knowledge was truly power, wouldn't professors would rule the world?