We often find ourselves bursting through the day trying to finish all the tasks we have on our plates. There is just so much stuff to finish, so many different kinds of people to deal with and so many steps to be made to accomplish our goals. It can be quite overwhelming at times.  Think about the last book you finished. Think about all the chapters you’ve gone through. Was it necessary to read all the chapters to understand the concept described by the book? Or could you read the introduction, the table of contents, choose the most interesting parts of the book, only go through them and still get the idea? Or even more, could you read only the introduction of the chapters, their conclusions and just skim through the rest? How efficient would that be compared to what you actually did?

In this article, we will take a look at the 80/20 principle and how it can improve your efficiency in a very significant way.

The 80/20 principle, also known as the Pareto principle tells us that

“in any population, some things are likely to be much more important than others. The usual standard is that “80% of results or outputs flow from 20% of causes, and sometimes from a much smaller proportion.” (Koch)

A nice instance is Microsoft’s discovery that “80 percent of the errors and crashes in Windows and Office are caused by 20 percent of the entire pool of bugs detected, and that more than 50 percent of the headaches derive from a mere 1 percent of all flawed code” (Rooney). Thanks to Microsoft’s successful discovery, they could focus only on the 20%of causes to correct the huge 80% of the errors. Imagine how inefficient it would be for Microsoft to focus on all of the causes. There are probably only two ways that could end up. Either they’d figure out the 80/20 rule later on, or they would lose their competitiveness, which would lead to a loss of market share and a potential danger of crisis for their business.

However, the 80/20 principle is only a standardised form of the concept. The numbers do not matter. For example, the same idea is represented in the world’s distribution of wealth. According to Credit Suisse’s global wealth report in 20017, “the world’s 1% richest people have seen their share of the globe’s total wealth increase from 42.5% at the height of the 2008 financial crisis to 50.1%” (Neate). You can see that this is rather a 1/50 kind of scenario, but you get the idea. Did you have any issues understanding our explanation? Let us know in the reply section below!

Furthermore, this concept isn’t useful only for businesses or bigger bodies, which use it to identify the vital tasks of their functioning and focus on that.

You can use this in your personal lives as well!

The principle can help you so much with so many things. These range from choosing the 20% of people you spend time with that provide you with 80% of happiness to choosing the 20% of the exercises you do in the gym that give you 80% of the results you desire. The use of this rule is very, very broad. It is applicable to everything we do. It also links very well to the idea of Warren Buffet, who advises people to list the top 20 goals they have, choose the top 5 and ditch the others. This is, again, just another way of using the 80/20 rule. If you’re curious about more ways to keep your focus check out POST and if you want to know more about the thoughts of the amazing Warren Buffet, take a look at POST.

Click on the picture below for a direct link to get this great book!

Now, you might be wondering about how should you start this life-changing process of increasing your efficiency? We suggest you take it as any other new habit LINK you’re trying to implement. Start slow and simple. Begin with spending on 20% things that make you 80% happy, go on with reading only 20% of the book that actually interests you. Choose what suits you the best and go on with it.

It is always better to not jump straight into it but to start slowly and develop your habits over time.

Finally, I want to remind you of a very general, but life changing rule. If you don’t start now, you won’t get anywhere. This is where most people get these amazing concepts wrong. They read about it and they start planning that they will take action in a few days, or in  a few hours. NO! You need to start now! If you don’t, there is a very high chance that you will not.

Lesson of the day:

• “Was it necessary to read all the chapters to understand the concept described by the book? Or could you read the introduction, the table of contents, choose the most interesting parts of the book, only go through them and still get the idea” – Please do use this strategy when you read books. Life’s too short to read every single word of all the interesting texts. Understand the idea, then move on.

• The 80/20 rule says that “80% of results or outputs flow from 20% of causes, and sometimes from a much smaller proportion” (Koch). Use this idea! Think about it!
• The 80/20 principle (Pareto principle) is a very useful tool that helps people managing their efficiency. It is used by many, if not all, successful businesses and governments. However, it is also very much useful in your personal life!
• Start simple and slow. It will take time, but it will be a life-changer once you get used to the habit.

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How to easily get more time for yourself?

Time is our most valuable commodity. It is the only commodity you can never get back. Once you’ve invested it you will never get the same amount back anymore. However, I’m pretty sure we all kind of know that. Despite our awareness of that fact, we don’t use it wisely sometimes. By developing some morning routines you can easily indulge yourself a solid amount of time when you can truly self-realized. After having read this article, you will probably wonder why you haven’t used your own mornings as a powerful tool for your success. Let’s start with the most important element of the whole day…

Why should you begin your day with habits?

First of all if you want to transform your morning to an organized and effective time you need to stick with a routine. Your routine needs to be formed by several easy habits. You should be able to easily follow it every day. That is the main purpose. You want to make your morning regular in order to become more effective. When you automate your morning process you’ll reduce the number of decisions and the time you have to think about anything unnecessary in general, you will gain more time and energy to focus on the important issues. If you’re interested especially in the particular topic of developing habits and cultivating them, we would love to recommend our former post./..com/

How should my routine look like?

Well, it depends on your own appetite. Your morning is there for you. Your biggest aim is to get some spare time for yourself to do anything beneficial for your life. You should design it how it suits you. Someone is ok with getting up at 4 am, someone at 6. However, the principles are the same. Your routine should be formed by several habits that you repeat. Let’s begin with them!

Getting up early!

Let’s be honest. How many times did you have to snooze the phone during the last weeks? The biggest problem of the vast majority of people when getting up or trying to do so, is hidden in the repetition of pressing the snooze button of their alarms. What if I told you that after implementing some basic principles of your morning routine you will wake up every day at the exact same time no matter how late you’ll have fallen asleep the night before. In other words you won’t need your alarm to get you of the bed!

Why should I get up early?

Imagine the atmosphere of the calm and slow morning. Nobody is awake. You are the only one alert, looking forward to rising and challenge the new day. Getting up early gives you the ultimate kickstart and puts you ahead from the vast majority of people. You can get into the lead just by getting up earlier in the morning and gaining some valuable time for yourself. The peace of the morning is magical. Nobody is going to call you, look for you and bombard you with their messages. You are completely in charge of the present time and the following minutes. During the working day, you don’t know exactly what is going to happen and you have to respond to a lot of random stimuli, but in the morning, it is a completely different story. Become the architect of your first hour and you’ll become the winner of your day. So your first task is schedule yourself an early get up. It doesn’t matter when, but you have to understand the importance of calm morning time.

“I wake up early because I have no talent.” The Real Life Education

Stimulate your body and brain!

After several hours of deep sleep, your body needs a solid amount of water. Hydrate yourself first. Especially when you sleep well, roughly 7-9 hours, your body is dehydrated. Try drinking a glass of lukewarm water or you can add a lemon in order to boost your metabolism and help your fat-burning. At least try to stick with the glass of any water. You’ll activate your metabolism, your inner organs and you’ll lessen the fatigue in general. Eventually, try drinking simultaneously a cup of bulletproof coffee or a green tea depending on your taste to kickstart your brain. Or if you want to do it naturally, try to stretch your body, get yourself a run or do some basic workout. You’ll activate your muscles, brain and also your hormones. You will gain some positive vibes through this simple routine.

Inspire yourself! Try watching some motivational videos, listen to self-help podcasts or read some useful literature.  Do not read the messages or emails. They could have waited for the whole night, so I’m sure it will be alright to answer later. There is no emergency. Don’t surround yourself with the highlights of the “perfect” lives of other people on Instagram You deserve your all attention now. Remember that your mind is in the best position to grow in the morning. Use it wisely! Try being alone in your own world of growth.

“No matter how bad things are, you can at least be happy that you woke up this morning.” D. L. Hughley

Practice gratitude

In order to boost your positivity, it is very beneficial to take a few minutes from your morning to focus yourself on the things you are grateful for. This is the perfect way of training gratitude and becoming more humble as a person. You’ll be able to realize how lucky you are as soon as you start practising this simple method. Try to think of a few things that you are grateful for, that make you happy or just praise your spouse. Your attitude to your life will never be the same again.

Meditate for a while

Why not use five minutes to get some deep time only with yourself and your own thoughts. You can enjoy your calmest time with learning to meditate well. As you’ll be progressing with your meditation and getting used to it more, you’ll become way better at controlling your emotions, being more aware of the factors affecting your state of mind and you will feel much more empowered in general. /OurPostOnMeditation/

Schedule your day, schedule your path, schedule yourself a success

Make yourself a to-do list. You can literally schedule yourself a success. You need to have a clear purpose, some vision or at least a general plan of how you can work on yourself. Try to be as specific as possible. That is another great but simple activity you can consider to implement into your new morning routine. By adjusting your goals and adapting yourself to progress, you’ll become aware of what it will actually take to reach them. You will gain more self-confidence, especially after managing to have done what you have already listed for yourself. Schedule it and save yourself some time and nerves. When you know your goals, it is way easier to follow them properly.  

Focusing on yourself is not an act of selfishness

If you say you are busy, you often mean that you don’t have time. But actually, you are telling your environment that they are not on your list of priorities listed that high. What needs to be your biggest priority? Where do you have to begin? Well, with yourself.

Everyone should bear in mind that the most important thing is to love yourself first, take care of yourself properly and invest in yourself first. It could be your personal growth or anything else. The important thing is that by doing so first, you’ll become competent enough to spread the love and share your knowledge with the whole world. However, have in mind that you need to stop neglecting yourself. Every person has to begin with himself first. Be your priority and don’t be shy to do so. You are busy when you focus on yourself as well. Take your time to take care of your body and soul. Be alone. Your time is there for you. Just use that opportunity!

Lecture of the day

If you want to have some time you could dedicate to yourself, try getting up as early as possible. Your time is the most valuable commodity. Every single morning is a gift for you. Try to make the most of it by maintaining your ideal routine. To begin with, your routine, start repeating several simple habits that will automate your morning in a very efficient way. Remember, you can use your newly gained time for a plenty of useful activities to help yourself in every single area of development.

Try what works best for you and stick with it. You can activate your brain and body by various activities such as drinking coffee, tea or lemon water, you can do it with a morning run or a simple shorten workout right in front of your bed. You can try to meditate or schedule your life. You’ve got an opportunity to work on yourself absolutely without any distraction so be aware of that. You don’t have to be stressed whether you have an email to answer or a message to reply to. It’s your time, just enjoy working on yourself!

You’ve got the kickstart before anyone else does! EVERYONE ELSE IS SLEEPING.

Win your day by winning your morning. That is the ultimate key to gaining positivity, getting used to effectivity and welcoming your success.

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