In last week's blog, I touched on how to continue improving our work productivity by investing into one of our key assets - focus. Today I want to share specifically on our other key asset, energy, and the idea of environment.

Everything in your life right now can be classed as an environment, which has either a low or high level of energy to it -- your mindset, your office, your phone, your home, your thoughts, your body, your car…

I believe that for one to increase productivity and execute with flawlessness, there are three crucial environments we must learn to harness and utilize:

Environment 1 - Our Mindset

You have heard me share about emotional contagion - how we can literally catch the emotions and feel like those we surround ourselves with. There is also another school of thought known as ‘attitudinal contagion’ - how the beliefs and mindsets, words and focus of those we surround ourselves with affect our way of thinking. Dabble in mediocrity, perform with mediocrity. Associate with excellence, execute with excellence. Either way you are a product of your environment whether you are conscious to it or not. 

What are your limiting beliefs and self-talk telling you?

How aware are you of your unconscious anxiety?!

Does your routine and habits for the morning cause you to feel calm, optimistic and inspired or rushed, overwhelmed and fearful?

What type of language do you harness when the outer environment goes into uncertainty and turbulence?

When you surround yourself with fear and negativity, you activate the part of your brain that is not supportive of solutions, best decision making and creative of ideas.

Environment 2 - Spaces and Places

Think about your office for a moment. It is a place that serves a purpose -- a place to be disciplined and productive (that’s the idea anyway). In my office, I am conscious of the fact that if things start to become cluttered, the inbox starts flooding, the desk becomes drowned with paper and folders or if I leave distractions in front of me, such as my phone, the purpose of this environment is somewhat compromised. Its kind of like a length of chain, when I continue adding ‘links’, the ‘chain’ gets heavier and heavier. Similarly, my environment very quickly becomes one that encourages low levels of energy, overwhelm, and procrastination.

It’s not the load that breaks you down; it’s how you carry it.

What can you do to raise the energy in your office?

What’s the environment within your team producing?

What’s your environment at home creating?

Environment 3 - Our Physiology

Consider for a moment the relationship between your quantity/quality of rest and your ‘to do’ list. At first thought, it would seem that the less rest we take, the more we can achieve?! A lot of people only rest for the amount they have time for; however, ironically their productivity actually slows as their input/rest lessens. The truth is, it’s not how many hours you work necessarily, but the value you bring to those hours that truly matters; less mistakes and higher quality execution.

Most people are unaware of the secret to turning off and having deep patterns of high quality sleep. Take time to learn this so you can increase work productivity.

The problem is we can’t see our own game!

Sometimes we don’t know or are not consciously aware that we are in an environment that may actually be hindering us from what we could become. It often reminds me of summer when the comfort of the sun beaming down on my skin overpowers the fact that I might actually be burning!!

The truth is it’s easy to accept mediocrity. We live in a world where it is ok to mistake what’s common as being normal and its ok to settle for less than we could actually be achieving. My question for you today is:

Are your environments adding or subtracting your ability to work with world class productivity?

Do share your thoughts as I would love to hear from you.