How To Triple Your Week Without Anyone Noticing
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Balance is a lot about simplifying: deciding what is worth your effort and cutting out what just eats your time and gives nothing in return. But there is only so much you can cut out - you’ve got to do something. That’s why balance is also about finding the time for doing the things you want to do.
I have found one extra day.
Sure, it’s a bit shorter than the others (just seven hours), and it’s scattered throughout the week. But what can you expect from a virtual day that most people don’t even notice?
Yep. It’s a virtual day. A day that runs inside a normal day - just like a virtual machine is a computer that runs inside another computer. For the not so technically inclined readers, or the ones who just want to hear more details, I’ll explain.
How does the virtual day work?
You are probably familiar with the term multitasking? It means doing many things at once. Something computers are good at - and that humans just can’t do effectively.
But there is a secret: a big part of computers don’t do real multitasking, either. They just switch between tasks as they go. They give some processor cycles to the Microsoft Word you use for writing your book, then some to fuel your browsing experience, and so on.
So, adding a new program to the multitasking routine means finding some free CPU cycles for it and hoping it can be run without slowing down the other programs running.
We can do the same.
Just different.
The computer plays on a nanosecond level. We can’t get there, and neither should we (multitasking can damage your productivity by 30 percent or so…), but we can emulate the idea by using the free processor cycles we have every day.
Why does the virtual day work?
We spend a lot of our time doing something that doesn’t get us anywhere: watching TV, surfing the web, waiting for something to happen, sitting in a bus (technically that gets you wherever the bus is going…), or sleeping.
The idea behind a virtual day is one of the simplest ever - and that’s why it works so well:
Take one hour from any of those unproductive activities every day - and in a week you will have acquired seven hours more than the rest of the world!
Seven hours is almost a full working day, so it’s enough for some pretty big achievements.
And it’s enough for almost two full 4-hour work weeks (meaning that by using this method you actually get two extra weeks every week - tripling your productivity!)
How you can get one too
You know best what the idle moments that you can spend for your virtual day are, but here are some tips from my own experiences:
- Mornings: I try get up at 5 AM whenever I didn’t stay up for too long the night before. This way I not only get one extra hour before the rest of my family wakes up, but I also get to use some of my most productive time of the day working on my side business.
- The commute: If you have a laptop and manage to get a seat in a bus, the commute time is a great time to get some writing or planning done. Plus you’ll do some good for the environment while stealing time.
- The lunch break: Eat while working. That’s another half-an-hour. (Whether it’s healthy or not, that’s another story)
Unfortunately I haven’t yet mastered the four-hour work week so this virtual day is not quite enough to keep my side business rolling but I also need to do some work during the weekends and some evenings.
I still have learning to do before I can triple my week (right now I have just added one extra day to it) - but I’m working on it! Join me in trying it out!
This was the fourth article (1, 2, 3) in my series on building a profitable side business that doesn’t break your work/life balance. There are still three more articles coming, so if you don’t want to miss any of them, subscribe to my RSS feed!
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March 7th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
On other suggestion for gaining more hours in your work week is to eliminate commuting if possible. At my former employer, I had 45 minute trip one way, which added up to six hours a week (at 4 days per week). Now that I am working from my home office, that’s six more hours that I can dedicate either to my business or to just relaxing.
March 7th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Yep, that’s one of my biggest dreams, too!
My commute time is also 45 minutes one way, out of which I’m often able to use 30 minutes for business. But it doesn’t always work out that well. Today, for example, the bus was so filled that I had to stand for the whole time - so, no working on my laptop this morning. But if you have to commute, trying to work during the time is still better than nothing…
(Six hours a week is quite a lot of time when you really think about it, 312 hours a year, about 40 full work days!)
March 7th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
This is a great post, and yes, i need to be more productive.
March 8th, 2008 at 1:05 am
je suis tres content de voir vos bloc ceci avec plaisir merci je pense a vous.
March 8th, 2008 at 1:06 am
at what time you come to senegal?
March 8th, 2008 at 3:55 am
I do this without really thinking about actually getting an extra day because of it. I’m obsessive sometimes about working on my side business (web stuff) or hobby or whatever you want to call it. Any free time I have, I’m working. Be it my lunch break at work, or five minutes before I go to work in the morning, I’m working. Hopefully it will pay dividends one day. :)
PS: I’m still writing the secrets article! ;)
March 8th, 2008 at 8:12 am
@Sir Jorge: Thanks! I guess we are all trying to be more productive… The next question will probably be when to stop trying so hard.
@Pierre Adama Faye: I’m glad to be in touch with you again as well! I hope that some day we’ll be able to collect the money to visit Senegal - for now, I think it’s still too expensive for us.
@Deron: Ha, I thought you had forgotten about the secrets article already ;) Looking forward to it!
March 8th, 2008 at 9:36 am
I have to agree with you about tip one. I was selling flowers on the local market about two summers and I had to wake up about just 5 AM - it kinda changed my life. It’s not just getting couple more productive hours a day, becouse I’ve noticed that if you wake up earlier, you’ll be sharper for the whole day. Allthough it may seem strange, waking up too late just makes you tired.
So I agreed with your point one, but I have to disagree with point three. I’ve learned that when you’re working with computer for the whole day and especially if you spend time in front of computer also in your spare time, breaks are really, and I mean really important. You have to get proper breaks. Eat lunch, read the newspaper, listen to some music, smoke a cigarette, drink cup of coffee or small beer (only if you’re freelancer ;)… That will triple your productivity, so It’s not big deal to lose 30 minutes.
March 12th, 2008 at 10:46 am
Samuel has a point here (point three). I have found it helpful to be an idler for a part of the working week. That helps my motivation and also improves my creativity. I also try to take the best out of the fact that I work at home, so I might step into my sauna to relax in the middle of working day and let the mind wonder. I have had some of my best ideas in those session (remember not to take your laptop with you).
BTW everyone should read the books of great Tom Hodgkinson, “How To Be Idle” especially.
March 13th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
@Jussi, @Samuel: Yeah, I agree that in an ideal situation, taking a break from the computer every now and then (a sauna in the middle of the day sounds awesome!) is a productivity booster.
But when running a side business, it’s not always possible, so using my lunch break for answering blog comments or checking e-mail is a way to make it more likely that I’ll have the time to go to sauna in the evening when returning home.
That said, now you gave me one more reason to work hard to reach my goal of working from home… ahh… I just love my sauna. ;)
March 19th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
I love your three tips! I make use of all three, but number two is hard as I drive to work. To get around trying to type while driving, I picked up an inexpensive MP3 player that has record capabilities and also have a PDA where I can record my thoughts. Both are easy to activate when I drive. If I see something while driving, or think of something - I simply record it. At the end of the day, I go back to what I’ve recorded and turn it into a blog post or project.
Mohamed Bhimji’s last blog post: Are You A Highly Effective Online Entrepreneur?
June 18th, 2008 at 6:43 am
There is another term for this. It’s called being a workaholic.
June 18th, 2008 at 9:52 am
That’s a good point, woog!
But actually, by using these extra half-an-hours for work you may well free time from the evening - when it really matters. This way you are not working when you should be with your family.
At least that’s how I like to think about it.