I am developing a routine. A cycle. A set of hoops that I need to clear everyday to guarantee productivity everyday.

As I mentioned in my previous blog, I am reading (re-reading, actually) this book titled Deep Work, which discusses the work habits of the most successful individuals in history, how it works, and how it might work for us.

There are several work philosophies discussed in the book:

• Monastic
• Bimodal
• Rhythmic
• Journalist
• (there are probably more…I’m not done reading the whole thing)

Monastic, as you might have guessed, involves intense, multi-day sessions of working deeply. Monastic–monks–get it?

Bi-modal is only a partial implementation of the monastic philosophy. You turn into a monk only when it’s needed.

Among all these philosophies, Rhythmic is the most common and most doable. This is the one I am looking to implement. Rhythmic philosophy means having a set schedule to follow every day. Allocating a fixed time everyday for deep concentration sessions. These fixed schedule trains your brain to block out all the things unneccessary stuff on that schedule, exactly how disciplined brains wake up on exactly on the same everyday.

If you read biographies, you’ll read this habit often: wake up before sunrise, exercise or do some work til eight or nine in the morning when their kids aren’t up yet, then wind down for non-focus intensive activity for the next few hours–because that’s already accomplished.

I can give you one reason why that habit is difficult to accomplish in this country: traffic.

Traffic eats at least 4 hours of our day. Four hours that would’ve been spent doing something productive like working, exercising, or resting.

Developing a system is hard, but by no means is it not doable. It needs to be easy to follow, and flexible enough to allow for the unpredictable traffic in Metro Manila.

I am in the initial stages of creating this system, but I already have some steps that I know I must put on my daily routine:

• at least 15 minutes of exercise, longer on weekends.
• at least 10 minutes of meditation
• at least 5 HOURS away from my phone.
• 30 minutes for a hobby.
• 30 minutes of reading a book.

I’m thinking of integrating technology into this workflow to make it easier to follow. I have a Pebble watch that can track my steps–I could replace the 15 minute exercise with x amount of steps. The upcoming Siri shortcuts feature in the iOS 12 update may also be helpful in setting flexible alarms, depending on what time you triggered the shortcut.

Habits are important. It keeps me away from impulsive behaviours that I know I am prone to commit. When I’m done reading Deep Work, I want to re-read the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

All this talk about discipline and routines is making me sound like I already have life figured out. I don’t. I’m doing all this to find my flow.