People often overestimate what they can do in a day, while drastically underestimating what they can do over the course of multiple years.
There are certainly people with tremendous determination and perseverance who can push through temporary roadblocks to achieve goals, but even those people can’t sustain sprinting through life forever. Proper pace and moderation are necessities for prolonged, sustainable success and avoiding burnout.
When we’re realistic about how long our goals will take to accomplish, they can seem much more daunting than when we base our expectations off of other people’s experiences. The larger the objective is, the harder it is for us to start taking the necessary actions to move towards the goal.
Breaking the macro target into realistic, achievable actions is the first step in successful planning. Setting our expectations too high often results in unnecessary failure.
Once that is done, think about what the “minimum effective dose” of work is for you; in other words, what is the least that you can do in a day that will leave you feeling satisfied?
When you concretely define your actions, being productive becomes much easier. Rather than blindly working in spurts of energy, your focus can be directed at your scheduled tasks, and once those tasks are completed you are free to spend the rest of your time as you wish, guilt free.
Not only does this increase your productivity, but it also reduces your procrastination as you can be much more intentional about how you spend your time.
Work hard, play hard. It’s all about intention and balance.