15 | Unhealthy Habits That Are Hurting Your Productivity -

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Table of Contents

Podcast Description

As an online entrepreneur, your daily routine matters so much more than you probably realize. For that reason, you’ll want to avoid some unhealthy habits that hurt your productivity because let’s face it … your time is extremely limited as it is.

Having unhealthy habits as part of your routine is something that can not only negatively impact you but your business as well. So in today’s episode, we’re going to talk about some of the most common habits I see (and experience myself too), but should avoid as much as possible.

Links Referenced in Episode:

▶ Listen to episode 8: Focus On Yourself, Not Others and Here’s Why

▶ Listen to episode 10: How To Prevent Burnout as an Entrepreneur (And Why You Should Care)

▶ Listen to episode 11: Using Strategic Systems to Reduce Your Overwhelm

Connect with me:

Website | FB Group | Instagram

Episode Transcript

(Note: This is a formatted AI-generated transcript to make it easier for you to read through, but is not an optimized blog post. Please excuse any spelling or grammar errors and filler words – it’s just how I speak LOL)

Episode Introduction

As an online entrepreneur, your daily routine matters so, so much more than you probably realize. And for that reason, we want and need to avoid some unhealthy habits that hurt your productivity because let’s face it… our time is extremely limited as it is. And having unhealthy habits as part of your routine is something that can not only negatively impact you, but your business as well.

So today we’re going to talk about some of the most common habits I see, and let’s be real. I experienced them myself too, but we should really avoid as much as possible. Are you ready? Let’s do this!

Hey, I’m Lucy Reyes, your host of the Cheerful Productive Chats Podcast, where I’m on a mission to help online entrepreneurs like you focus on all the right things and kiss overwhelm goodbye. Here, you’re going to learn strategies that will boost your productivity so that you can scale your online biz and impact lives sooner. It’s your time to shine! So let’s get started.

Hey, welcome back to the Cheerful Productive Chats Podcast, episode 15. Now, today may burst some bubbles and may not be the best opinion out there. But I felt like it was something important to share, especially since this question was specifically brought up from someone within my own audience.

And the question was, what are some unhealthy habits that a blogger and business owner should avoid? And that’s exactly what I’m going to be sharing today.

While this is not the full list because let’s be honest, there are lots of unhealthy habits that we all do all of the time. But it does include some of the most common ones I see come up most often with my students and myself as well, because hey, like no one is perfect.

But that doesn’t mean that we can’t work towards improving ourselves and becoming the best business owner that we can possibly be without draining ourselves in the process.

What are some unhealthy habits that a blogger and business owner should avoid?

So here are some of the unhealthy habits that we online entrepreneurs should avoid doing as much as possible, especially since they’re the ones that hurt your productivity too. And, you know, that’s something that we do not want around here. We are trying to be productive on this podcast. Not the opposite.

Scrolling on social media

So the first unhealthy habit that’s hurting your productivity and something you likely do every day, yes, me included, is to scroll carelessly on social media.

How many times have you gotten distracted or you’re procrastinating because you don’t want to do something? So you just pull up your phone and you’re just like, “ah, you know, let me just check out what’s going on.” And then that one minute of checking what’s going on on Instagram turned into 10, 15, 30 minutes of you just scrolling.

Or maybe it’s even when you were trying to be productive, like you were only on Instagram because you were specifically trying to upload whatever you were uploading for the day. And then you kind of just started scrolling and scrolling and in your head, you’re like, “oh, I’m just getting ideas. I’m saving the reels that I’m going to do. I’m getting inspiration. I’m doing my 10 minutes of daily Instagram engagement,” or whatever it is.

But are you really? Are you really going to go back to those reels that you saved and actually do them? So one of those things is scrolling on social media carelessly. That’s one of the things that we should probably avoid doing as much as we can.

Constantly checking stats or emails throughout the day

The second thing is constantly checking stats or emails throughout the day.

Checking your stats

So, depending on what type of online business owner you are, you have several different stats. And I know that when you’re new at something, especially, you’re constantly checking to see what has been happening. Has something improved?

So for example, If you’re a blogger and you’re working towards trying to increase your page views. How many times are you on Google analytics checking how many page views did I have yesterday? How many page views did I get last week? How many page views did I get last month? How many times are you checking?

I know that when I was very actively blogging, I have the Google analytics app on my phone and I would be checking it all the time, especially when I was really, really close to hitting my Mediavine goal of 50,000 sessions. I was always on my phone. I was always checking every single day. Did I make it? Did I make it? Am I ready to apply?

Yeah, that was not productive. And I know that it’s probably happening to you too, especially if it’s something that you’re actively working on.

Another stat that you’re probably checking is your sales, especially if you’re in the middle of a launch or you just launched a new product. Maybe you just got your evergreen funnel up.

Now you’re constantly checking to see how many sales you have. Maybe you’re checking how many subscribers you have. Maybe you were just in a bundle. Maybe you get a freebie swap. Maybe you did something and you’re like, okay, I just got this landing page up. How many subscribers am I getting? And you’re constantly checking.

Whatever stats drive you, you’re probably checking them more often than you need to. Okay. Now, can you imagine what other things you could be doing besides checking those stats? So what could you be doing instead of seeing how many page views you have on your blog? You could probably be doing some keyword research.

How many email subscribers do I have? In those 15 to 30 minutes that just passed by, what could you have done? You could have probably recorded a few reels. You could have probably improved your opt-in page.

There’s so many things you could have done within those 30 minutes. So definitely do not check your stats multiple times a day.

Checking your emails

And the same is true for your emails because as much as you want to get to that inbox zero, checking your inbox multiple times a day is not going to help with your productivity and it’s just going to make you lose focus multiple times in a day.

Because even though it might just take a few minutes to respond to that one email, it takes you so much longer to regain your focus after that.

So definitely set a time within your day to intentionally go into your inbox and check them. It could be once, twice, three times a day. I would probably not recommend three times a day, but you set whatever feels good to you. And then just stick to that. Only check within that timeframe and then get everything else done around that.

Trying to make everything perfect

The next thing for you to avoid another unhealthy habit is trying to make everything perfect. Now, listen, this is coming from a perfectionist. So yes, I know the struggle of trying to make everything perfect. I try really, really, really hard to just do like B+ type work and it’s still really hard for me. And I know that it’s really hard for you too.

But we can’t just sit and try to make everything perfect. You know, it’s going to be very, very hard to please everyone, even if it is perfect. So you’re trying like, think about why you’re trying to make something perfect. Like, what are those reasons why you really don’t want to either get that blog posts published, to get that product out, send out that email?

How many times do you reread an email before you actually hit send? I know when I was first starting, I would reread it over and over and over, and be like, does this sound good? Please tell me that I am not alone in this. I think this happens more, especially whenever you are brand new at something. And you’re just like, “oh my gosh, I just have to make it work.”

I’m going to be completely honest and say that when I first started this podcast, I mean, I’m only 15 episodes in at this point, but when I started it, those very first four episodes. I did this so much. I tell you not to do it and I try myself not to do it, but I did it. I did it and I need the reminders sometimes too. You know, but I struggle with it. I did rerecord a lot of those episodes because I was just like, “no, it’s not perfect. These are my first few episodes. I need them to sound perfecttttttt.”

And eventually, you know, I got tired of just repeating the same thing over and over again. And now, thankfully, I’ve gotten to a point where it’s like, huh? I actually don’t need to re-record any episode because you know what? It’s okay. It doesn’t need to be perfect.

So really, really try to not worry about making something perfect because you’re not going to please everyone, no matter what. So if that isn’t the reason why you’re trying to make it perfect.

If there’s other reasons why, really try to figure out what those reasons are and then work towards just helping you get okay with putting something out in the world that’s good enough because the longer you hold onto it, the longer is going to take someone else to get it, to receive it, to consume it.

And it might be something that they need right away. Right. They might need it as soon as possible. And you are the person that’s going to deliver it to them. Whether it’s a podcast episode, a blog post, an email, a product, someone needs it. Someone out there needs it so you need to get it to them.

Comparing yourself to others

Okay. Now the next thing is also something that I know many of us struggle with. But you really, really need to learn to not do it. And that’s comparing yourself to others. Now I have a full episode on this, episode eight. So definitely go back and listen to that episode if this is something that you struggle with.

I could go on and on about comparing yourself to others because it is so unhealthy. So because I do have a full podcast, I’m not going to go into that one specifically in too, too much. Definitely go listen to episode eight if you need to.

But what I will say is every single person that you’re probably going to try to compare yourself to has different circumstances than you. They have a different life. They live a different lifestyle. They have different distractions, different things going on in their life.

Not to say one of you is better than the other, but both of you, whoever you’re comparing yourself to, have completely different circumstances, all of which will take a huge part in how they do things, how they get things done, how they live and run their business. Okay.

So definitely do not compare yourself. So I’m not going to get on a rant here because I can definitely, definitely talk about this for, I mean, I have a whole episode on it so go listen to the episode if you compare yourself all the time, go listen to episode eight. Okay.

Constant context or task switching

Now the other thing that is something that’s unhealthy, that you shouldn’t be doing as much is context or task switching. So, what I mean by this is when you are constantly switching from tasks back and forth.

So maybe, you are going from recording a podcast episode to editing it to going on social media, then you’re kind of coming back to recording another podcast episode.

Like you’re just constantly switching versus have you ever tried to just kind of do the same thing and then you’ve ever thought something like, “oh, I’m in the zone,” or like, “oh, like I’m already in this mode so I’m just going to keep going.” Right.

Like maybe you’re like, I’m just going to work on, I don’t know, creating graphics for an hour, but then you’re like in that zone of creating graphics, and the longer you do it, the faster you get because now your brain has already been conditioned that, okay, this is what I’m working on. And now it’s getting easier and faster. Right.

So that is what you should really be doing instead of trying to go back and forth between different tasks. So one thing that’s really going to help you avoid context and task switching as much as you can possibly avoid it is to implement strategic systems and to get organized. This is really going to help you because you’re going to know exactly what you need to do.

Another reason why context and task switching comes up is also because you forgot to do a task. Maybe you’re in the middle of writing a blog post and you’re like, whoa, like I forgot that I needed to add a pin and now you kind of hop over, go to Canva and then you create a pin graphic and then you go back to your blog posts and then you add it, right.

Well, you just lost your focus there by having to switch over, create one graphic, go back to your blog post, add it and now you kind of lost that mojo.

So, if you were to have strategic systems in place and you had workflows, a workflow that tells you step-by-step exactly what you need to work on every single time that you’re going to write a blog post.

It would already help you avoid not doing certain tasks because you’re already going to know what they are. So if you don’t know what I mean by strategic systems, go listen to episode 11, where I talk about it a whole lot more.

Not making time for self-care

Now, the next thing is one of the most important ones, which is not making time for self care. Listen, I know that you’re busy. I know that you’re a busy entrepreneur and I know that you’re busy outside of entrepreneurship, too.

Whether you have a family, whether you have a job, whether you have health conditions, whatever it is. You are busy. I know, I know that you’re busy, but that doesn’t mean that you cannot make time for yourself.

You not making time for yourself is a choice. It is a choice. It is not something that you can be like, “oh, I don’t have time for self care.” No, you are choosing to not make time for self care and that is so unhealthy.

You need breaks. You need to rest. You need to take care of yourself. Okay. So definitely take breaks. Practice self-care. Self-care isn’t just booking an hour at the spa. Okay. That is not what self-care has to be. It can be just a few minutes here and there. Okay.

If you don’t practice self care, you will end up burning yourself out and you do not want to do that. Okay. Episode 10, go listen to that if you want to learn more about burnout but definitely make time for self care.

Episode Wrap-Up

There, you have it. The unhealthy habits that you should avoid as a blogger or online entrepreneur that are really hurting your productivity. So I’m curious, did any of these resonate with you?

And can I let you in on a little secret? Sometimes these podcasts episodes are also great reminders for myself. They’re not just for you, I’ll be honest. They’re a lot of the times for me as well, because you know, we all do these things. So don’t feel like if you are and have been doing any of these unhealthy habits that you’re alone. Like no.

So many people go through this and it’s just a matter of trying to minimize it because I know it’s really hard to not scroll on social media or to not check your stats, but as long as we are aware that these could be a problem, then we can minimize it, you know?

So I definitely know that several of the ones I mentioned in today’s episode definitely resonated with me. So I’m curious if this is you too?

So take a screenshot of you listening and let me know which of these you’re most guilty of doing. And like I said, no shame, it happens to us all, but I am curious if you’re up for it.

So let me help you stay accountable on trying to avoid doing it as much as possible by you letting me know. All right. Thank you so much for tuning in. I’ll talk to you again next week.

Thank you so much for listening to the Cheerful Productive Chats Podcast with me Lucy Reyes. To view the complete show notes and all the links mentioned in today’s episode, visit cheerstoproductivity.com/15. And before you go, make sure you subscribe wherever you’re listening so that you know once the next productive chat is released. Talk soon and cheers to your productivity and success!