How to Increase Productivity as a Student

We all try to find the “perfect system” to be productive. For some that means practicing certain disciplines and others trying different ways to find motivation. Maybe some of these methods have worked for you or maybe you’re reading this because you’re still struggling to pick up the pen. So the question remains, “How do you increase productivity as a student?”. In the video above, Ali explains that he thinks we will always struggle if we don’t realize this simple truth. He calls it, “the real secret to productivity”.

Find Joy in the Journey

 This secret is to find joy in the journey. You may find this contrary to some motivational speakers you hear. Their consistent message is one of going through pain to achieve your goals.  Many of you may even think that pain is all there is at this part of your journey, that suffering is something you just have to bear until you reach the other side. This leaves many of us waking up each morning, dreading the day that’s ahead.

The reality is as humans we seek instant gratification. We find it difficult to go through short term pain to meet our long- term goals. Why is that? Why do we gravitate away from activities that give us little to no pleasure?

The Marshmallow Experiment

The Stanford Marshmallow experiment was conducted by psychologist Walter Mischel in 1972. The experiment involved placing a marshmallow in front of a child and then leaving the room. The child could choose to eat the marshmallow immediately but with a catch. They would forego the chance of having two marshmallows when the researcher returned. The results showed that the children who were able to delay their gratification to enjoy two marshmallows had a higher probability of becoming more successful at college in the future, earning higher incomes and were also less likely to become overweight.

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 The skill of self-control is an important cognitive and emotional skill that is essential to develop but when applied to real life, it takes much longer than 20 minutes to reach our goals, specifically long-term goals. How long as adults can we delay gratification to achieve goals that take 2 years or even 5 years? A solution to this question can be found in one of Ali’s suggestions which involves gamifying the process.

Increase Productivity As A Student by “Gamifying” the Process

“Gamifying” hinges on the fact that as humans we are goal oriented. When we gamify the process, we make learning more fun. This is where you can breakdown your long-term goals into short term goals with shorter intervals of delayed gratification. Each time you reach one of these goals you can reward yourself for the progress you have made. These rewards, reaching your milestones and having fun along the way will keep you motivated. This then leads to an increase in your overall productivity as a student.

Ali describes using different colour codes to represent different stages of his learning at medical school. This motivated him to study more as he would want to see the colours change. In my own life as a musician my motivation came from setting speed targets for my playing. When I began doing this, I would always want to see the number increase which motivated me to do some exercises which would have been boring otherwise.

Does Work Always Have to Equal Suffering ?

Ali agrees that this approach of work equals suffering may be necessary if you want to become the best in the world at something. For E.g. An Olympian, but for most of us we just want to do our best. We’re not focused on competing with others, but rather on competing with ourselves. The goal being to become a better version of ourselves every day.

   “Let your work feel like fun” seems like a cliché we’ve heard quite too often and one too good to be true. Ali explains two ways in which this usually presented to us. The first is to “find your passion” and “do the things that you enjoy”. However, there are two problems with that, firstly not everyone knows what their passion is and not everyone’s passion can provide a sustainable form of income.

The second approach which Ali stated he follows is to learn to enjoy the things that you are doing. There may always be some aspects of our studies or job that we find particularly boring. Performing these tasks cause us to lag behind, become demotivated, decreasing our overall productivity.

Tips To Increase Productivity As A Student

So the question still remains, how exactly do you get yourself to enjoy something you don’t take pleasure in?  Sounds a bit forced you might think but before you rush to judgement, here are 4 more tips Ali has shared to help you begin making this shift:

1) Shift your mindset

I am always sincere but never serious”

Alan Watts

This has to do with shifting your view to one that says, the work you are going to do is going to be fun. I think sometimes all we focus our attention on is crushing deadlines and just getting things done. Instead we should try to focus more on creating and producing something that we can be proud of. I think when we take this approach, trying to increase productivity as a student will take care of itself.

2) Bring Friends on Board

Having friends to help us with work or our studies help to ease our workload at times. Our friends are able to offer different perspectives and knowledge in areas that we are weaker in. Those that we can laugh with makes learning more fun, of course ensuring that the focus remains on the task at hand.

3) Set an Environment Conducive to Having Fun

This when applied can look differently for each individual. Maybe there’s a particular cup and coffee that you like drinking when studying. Maybe there’s a particular lighting or like some people I know, there’s a little plant you like seeing on your desk. Putting these things in place creates an environment where learning feels more fun, increasing productivity.

4) Are We Working on the Right Things?

Productivity is also connected to the meaning we derive from our work. There’s only so much we can do into tricking our brains into having fun when it does not want to. We must ultimately come to the point to ask ourselves the question of, “Is this meaningful to me?”. Staying in a job or studying a subject that offers little to no fulfilment in our lives would leave us feeling unhappy no matter how much we try to convince ourselves we enjoy it otherwise.

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