How To Be More Productive Than Everyone Else - The 4 Levels Method

There are four levels of productivity that every student or professional should master and each of these four levels unlocks a different level of

result. Unfortunately, most people are

result. Unfortunately, most people are stuck at level one or two. The sad truth is that if you are stuck at these lower levels, then your life is going to feel miserable. You're going to struggle to

miserable. You're going to struggle to balance work and life. You'll struggle

to progress your career. You'll feel

constantly overwhelmed. And over time, you'll start believing that you are just naturally not a productive person. But

that is not true. Across the thousands of people that I've coached, I found that once you're able to master all four levels, you're not just able to get more done. You can actually do it with less

done. You can actually do it with less stress and even enjoy the process.

Because real productivity isn't just hustling for the sake of it. Real

productivity is having the freedom and control to live life the way you want to. So, by the end of this video, you'll

to. So, by the end of this video, you'll know exactly which level of productivity you're currently operating at and more importantly, how you can progress through each level. The first level is called tracking. And when you are at

called tracking. And when you are at level one, the result this gets you is that you feel that you are struggling.

Not exactly a great result. Tracking is

the most basic form of trying to achieve things and juggle responsibilities. It

means you have general intentions of things that you want to do and you are trying to do them and all you do is just keep track of how well it's going.

Sometimes you feel like you're behind.

Sometimes you feel like you're on top of it. Most of the time you feel like

it. Most of the time you feel like you're overwhelmed. And at this level

you're overwhelmed. And at this level you can't really be productive unless you have just a few very simple responsibilities because you actually just don't have any idea what you are doing and how you're spending your time.

Now this is totally fine if you don't care about being productive. But if you do have a lot of things that you want to balance, then this is a terrible place to be because you have very little control and therefore very little

freedom. Now, if you want to get from

freedom. Now, if you want to get from level one to level two, then the first thing that you should do is go from tracking mentally to explicitly.

Mental tracking is what I explained before where you kind of just have a sense of what you're doing. explicitly

tracking is actually sitting down, getting a piece of paper in front of you, and then writing down how long you spend on the different things throughout the day. Create a written timeline of

the day. Create a written timeline of how you spend your time. This is

incredibly useful as a first step, even if you are at a higher level. I actually

recommend that people do this every now and again. I first started doing this

and again. I first started doing this when I was in university, and it was a game changer. I was in my second year of

game changer. I was in my second year of university going through medical school, tutoring about 20 to 30 hours a week at the time. Um, spending my free time

the time. Um, spending my free time learning about learning science, trying to socialize and go to the gym. And I

felt pretty overwhelmed. And so when I did this activity, I realized that I was spending a lot of time just traveling to and from activities and didn't realize how much of my entire day was spent on

just commuting. And then the second

just commuting. And then the second thing is that there were these gaps in my day that I just couldn't account for.

Like I don't know what I was doing between this activity and then this activity. And these are actually the two

activity. And these are actually the two exact benefits that doing this exercise creates. So by seeing where I was

creates. So by seeing where I was spending more time than I realized, for example, with commuting, it allowed me to rethink the way that I use that time.

I realized that a lot of my admin and planning or reviewing things that I'd studied before could be done just during the commute. But the second benefit is

the commute. But the second benefit is that it shows you where you're not even aware how the time is being spent. After

I saw that there were these gaps of time I couldn't explain, I realized that I was actually procrastinating for a lot longer during that time than I realized.

The 5 minutes scrolling on Instagram actually ended up being more like 25 minutes of scrolling. And there were hours per day that were being wasted just here and there. So if you're starting at level one, one of the best

things that you can do is just get visibility on how you are spending your time. If there are issues, you want to

time. If there are issues, you want to be able to see them and point to them.

And from there, we can move on to level two. Level two is frontloading.

two. Level two is frontloading.

And once you are frontloading your productivity, you unlock the result of overwhelmed. And at this point, you

overwhelmed. And at this point, you might be thinking, isn't it meant to get better when I go from level one to level two? And the answer is yes. But also, if

two? And the answer is yes. But also, if you do have a lot of things to balance, it's actually, I found, not enough to just be at level two. You are still

going to struggle with most of the same things even at level two. But level two is still important because it builds some of the foundational skills that you

need to get to level three. So, what is level two? Frontloading is all about

level two? Frontloading is all about making life easier for yourself in advance. It's about spending time on a

advance. It's about spending time on a Saturday or a Sunday or on the evening the day before to plan for your day to come. It's creating systems and

come. It's creating systems and processes and structures that make it easier for your brain to just execute and do things and have clarity throughout the day. So, these are

techniques such as using a to-do list or basic scheduling. If you're someone who

basic scheduling. If you're someone who has lots of ideas throughout the day and you need to do something with those ideas, then it could be about creating an ideas collection.

Basically, when you have an idea, you you put the ideas somewhere so that you can come back to it later and it's not distracting and disturbing you throughout the day. And so, for me, a lot of my early years of university was spent in this level two. I kept

meticulous to-do list that I updated every single day. I always made sure I created a schedule for myself a week in advance. And the goal when you're doing

advance. And the goal when you're doing this is that you want to have clarity.

If you have an item on your to-do list, you don't want it to say something like read a book. You want it to be a little bit more specific, something that you know has a start and an end point.

Likewise, when you are creating a schedule, you want it to be very clear what you are doing. It's not just a study block or a work block. What are

you going to be studying? What are you going to be working on throughout the day? You don't want to be worrying about

day? You don't want to be worrying about what am I meant to do next? That will

take you out of flow and crush your productivity. You want to be like a

productivity. You want to be like a robot just automatically moving from task to task to task. It's a lot more energy efficient. It's a lot less

energy efficient. It's a lot less stressful. It gives your brain better

stressful. It gives your brain better focus and concentration. And it means that you'll finish those things faster as well, giving you more free time at the end of the day. Now, all of these

things sound good. So why then in that case when you are at level two and you're doing all of these things and you're frontloading, why are you still feeling overwhelmed? Well, the reason

feeling overwhelmed? Well, the reason is, and you will know this if you have tried creating a to-do list and scheduling consistently for a long period of time, is that it is very easy to feel like there is too much you need

to do. There are too many things to fit

to do. There are too many things to fit into your schedule. And your schedule almost just ends up being like a record of your failures where every single day you look at your schedule and realize that you didn't complete half of it. The

items on your to-do list just continually get pushed back and back and just continues to grow every single day.

And before long, it feels like your to-do list is not a tight list of actionables to focus on, but a endless, neverendingly growing backlog of debt

that is so overwhelming that you don't even want to look through it anymore.

Now, for years throughout university, I thought that that was an issue with the way that I was doing my to-do list or the way that I was doing my scheduling and the way that I was doing my time blocking or time boxing. What I know now

is that that is just not the case at all. That is a natural part of being

all. That is a natural part of being stuck at level two. So, if you're doing all of these things and you're frontloading it and you're spending your evenings planning and every day you feel like you've got a plan, but at the end

of the day you feel like the plans almost don't even matter cuz you still feel overwhelmed. Don't worry, you're

feel overwhelmed. Don't worry, you're actually in the right place. The

progression for you is to move to level three. This is the level where things

three. This is the level where things start feeling easier. Level three is the level of prioritization.

And when you are at level three, you unlock the result of progressing.

You feel like you are progressing towards your goals. You feel like with each passing day and every week, you are making meaningful movement towards the things that really matter to you. That

is a rare feeling that a lot of people struggle to experience. And the reason it is so hard to get this result and to feel this and to stay at level three is

because getting to level three actually feels very difficult and that is the sign of doing level three correctly.

Prioritization at this level it's all about choosing what you say no to versus what you say yes to. It is about

understanding that saying yes to something is saying no to something else. It is about understanding that

else. It is about understanding that saying no to something is saying yes to something that may be more important.

And the reason it's difficult is that this to-do list, the stuff that you felt at some point was important enough to add to a list of things for you to spend

your time doing usually means that it is something important in your life. So

saying no to it is going to feel bad.

Effective prioritization feels bad because you're saying no to things that are important. They're just

not as important at this moment in time as something else. There are some things that can be so transformative and life-changing and help you move towards

your goals that might only take a couple of hours a week, but you're never going to have even those couple of hours a week without saying no to something

else. And I feel this time and time

else. And I feel this time and time again where I look at something that I did like three years ago and I will wonder why did I ever waste so much of

my time on doing that. And if I could give you one piece of advice to potentially save you those years of wasted time is that say yes to joining

my free newsletter. Because in my free newsletter, I go through these pains of sacrifice that I reflect on this wasted time and then how I was able to flip

that and reclaim that time for myself. I

share the things that allowed me to unlock each level of productivity and each level of learning. And seriously,

if I think about all the things that I said no to in the past, the time spent with loved ones that I'm never going to get back, there's so much time that I

paid due to the cost of inefficiency.

And even though I can't go back in time with what I know now, I hope at least it can save some of you time to reclaim a little bit of your life so that you can spend your time doing the things that

really, really matter to you. So, if

you're interested in joining the newsletter, it's free. uh it comes to you every single week. Takes a few minutes to read. I'll leave a link in the description for you to check out.

Now, I want to share with you at least one of the biggest tips on prioritization. That is actually in one

prioritization. That is actually in one of the newsletters as well. A lot of the people that I coach really struggle with this. Um if you've got family, you've

this. Um if you've got family, you've got kids, you, you know, got loved ones that you want to spend time with, they're valuable. You don't want to be

they're valuable. You don't want to be the person that is saying no to the people you care about and instead saying yes to, you know, work or study instead.

And the important perspective that I try to coach to anyone that feels that way is that prioritization is about tasks, not about values. Even if you, let's

say, value spending time with your family, and that's just very important for you in your life, that's great. But

it doesn't mean that therefore any task is put second in priority to spending time with your family. And this is because there are other things that you may value. So just for example, you may

may value. So just for example, you may value financial stability. You may value career progression. These may be things

career progression. These may be things that are important to you and they may not be as important as for example family is to you, but they're still important enough that you want to

balance that in your life. But if at every point of decision-m family is always trumping everything else, then that means you're saying no to

everything else. The more sophisticated

everything else. The more sophisticated and sustainable way of creating balance is to understand that you can on some days prioritize certain tasks above

others. Even if that's not the same

others. Even if that's not the same priority of your values, but on a daytoday, week-to-eek basis, that order can and should fluctuate. And that is

how you achieve balance. So next time you're thinking about saying no to something that's really important to you, don't think about it as saying no.

Think about it as not right now. And

instead of feeling guilty about saying no, try to just feel mindful. Be mindful

that you've said no to this right now.

So maybe you want to make time for it next week or the week after to make sure you say yes to it instead of beating yourself up over saying no to things.

Congratulate yourself for saying yes to the right things at the right time. For

me, learning to prioritize really well has been one of my major focuses for the last seven or eight years. And what it has unlocked for me is completely

life-changing. I mean, it's allowed me

life-changing. I mean, it's allowed me to achieve more and unlock more opportunities than I ever thought would be possible 8 years ago. I feel I'm in a

better position with more progress, with more balance and more free time, and in the healthiest state of mind that I've ever been in. And so much of that is

based on just learning where to say no.

So that's level three, the third level of productivity. And on this diagram,

of productivity. And on this diagram, you know, you can see it's kind of the same size as, you know, level one and level two. But in reality, level three

level two. But in reality, level three is just where the biggest return on your investment is going to come from. Like

you can spend as long as you like being great with level one and being great with your level two skills and it's not going to make really any meaningful difference to your quality of life compared to just being really good at

level three. In fact, the concept of

level three. In fact, the concept of scheduling and figuring out when you should do things is so much less important than actually knowing what you

should even be doing in the first place.

So in that case, what could be left?

What could level four be? Level four is the blissful level of productivity which is called flow. And when you enter into

level four and you achieve flow, the result that you are reaching is unstoppable.

It sounds like an exaggeration, but when you're able to do all of these lower levels and you're able to prioritize and you're able to then enter into deep focus and flow where your concentration

and your quality of work is just at its maximum, you truly feel like there is nothing you can't do. As long as you decide that this is something that you want to do, you have this confidence in yourself that you can do it and you can

operate at the highest level that your brain allows. People look at you and

brain allows. People look at you and they say this is a person of great discipline, of great willpower, of you know, great productivity. But you

yourself will not feel that it is all that difficult. In fact, it feels easier

that difficult. In fact, it feels easier than it's ever been to do more than you've ever been capable of. So, just to be clear, what does it mean by having

flow? Flow is a state of mind that you

flow? Flow is a state of mind that you enter into when you do deep work. In

fact, you've probably felt this before already. Even at the lower levels, it's

already. Even at the lower levels, it's when time is just flying by and you feel completely locked into your task. The

difference at level four is that this flow is not sporadic. It is not inconsistent. You are able to trigger

inconsistent. You are able to trigger this flow state whenever you need to.

And a high percentage of your time when you're trying to work and concentrate is spent in this flow state. And so at level three with prioritization, we were clear on what we should be spending our

time doing. At level four, we know that

time doing. At level four, we know that when we do spend that time on it, it's going to produce the highest quality of work. So, how do we get into this

work. So, how do we get into this mystical flow state? Well, there are two tips that I want to give you. The first

tip is to remove your distractions.

So, there's the obvious angle of this, which is to turn your phone on, do not disturb. Uh, you know, make sure there's

disturb. Uh, you know, make sure there's nothing obviously distracting on your desk, things like that. But the less obvious one that's actually even more helpful I think is actually let the people around you know that you're going

to be doing some focused work. And if

possible not to distract you especially if you are you know at home and you're working and you've got you know people that will come in you've got kids whatever it is see if you can arrange for a period of time where that can be

somewhat protected and respected by the people around you. When I do consultations for companies and organizations, uh, one of the systems that I recommend is to use a sticky note system. So, if you've got a desk or a

system. So, if you've got a desk or a cubicle and you're trying to do some deep focused work with people around you, then have a sticky note of a certain color and then put it on your cubicle or on your desk so that when

people come up to talk to you, they see that color and they know that that's an indicator, okay, this person's essentially in like a physical do not disturb bubble. Come back another time.

disturb bubble. Come back another time.

The second thing is to play some kind of white noise. Now, I have had to do some

white noise. Now, I have had to do some deep focused work in all sorts of situations in a cramped plane on a 6-hour flight on the back of a Uber in the middle of India. In fact, in the

early days of running my business, I didn't even have a proper desk to work on. So, I'd be working off of this tiny

on. So, I'd be working off of this tiny little tray table that is so small, I couldn't even fit a mouse next to my laptop. And in these un ideal

laptop. And in these un ideal situations, one of the things that I feel is consistently the most powerful trigger to help you immediately enter into these flow states is just creating

an auditory focus bubble. And so there are these white noise apps that I used to download and sort of customize and configure and all sorts of different ways. Um, and normally if I was making

ways. Um, and normally if I was making this video a year ago, I would just recommend those apps to you and show you how I configured them to just have the best possible effect. But I'm not going

to do that anymore because recently I've actually started using Brain FM. And

Brain FM is actually a sponsor for this video. But I'm telling you that ever

video. But I'm telling you that ever since I started using Brain FM, I just don't use any of those other white noise apps at all anymore. I've just

uninstalled them completely. Brain FM is this app that uh plays focus music for you. There's a particular type of music

you. There's a particular type of music that actually uses something called neural phase locking, which is this phenomenon that happens in the brain where the things you listen to change

your brain wave frequency. And so they figured out what sounds to play to force your brain into the state of deep focus.

So I always have my noise cancelling headphones available next to me and if I need to return to deep flow, I'll turn it on and within less than a minute I'm in deep flow and it's very very

consistent. And the good thing is that

consistent. And the good thing is that it's also consistent if you have ADHD.

So they've actually studied this and they've even published on this that their music is helpful for developing focus, especially if you have ADHD. So

anyway, I'm a big fan. Uh I get literally hundreds of emails from companies wanting to sponsor me for my YouTube and I say no to all of them.

Brainer Fame is one of the few companies that I actively worked to try to get a partnership with. So, if you're

partnership with. So, if you're interested in trying this out, then you can use my code brain.fm/justins

and you get 30 days for free as a trial.

Even if you're not at level four of productivity, give it a go. It's going

to make your life easier and it might actually help you to move through all the other levels as well. So, these are the four levels of productivity. And if

you want to learn a little bit more about how you can improve your scheduling or your prioritization skills, then you may also want to check out this video I have on that topic right here. Thank you so much for

right here. Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you in this video, I guess.