11 Habits That Destroy Your Productivity | Unproductive Habits To Avoid

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Successful people know that success requires productivity. That’s why you need to know about these 11 habits that destroy your productivity.

Read also: 55 Ways to Get Out of a Slump | How to get Motivated

Read also: 11 Tips to Study Effectively | How I Study for Law Exams

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1. Having YouTube, Pinterest, Facebook taps open while you work

I’m one of those people who keeps a ton of tabs open in their internet explorer so that I can quickly jump between them. 

Most of the time, this habit can be beneficial. However, whenever you are trying to get work done, it can destroy your productivity. 

It is all too tempting to ‘just take a look’ at that open YouTube video, Pinterest image, or Facebook account. However, before you know it, you’ve already wasted 15 minutes clicking and scrolling around instead of working. 

So how can you ditch this unproductive habit? You could, of course, be hardcore and simply never leave open any taps to these sites. 

A more comfortable option would be to bookmark the page so you know you won’t miss out on it and can always find it again later. 

Or you could just use a different internet explorer for work-related purposes. Perhaps Google Chrome for private purposes, Microsoft Edge for work-related purposes, and Firefox for other projects. 

2. Listening to fast-paced music or songs with lyrics

 I get it; sometimes, you just want to vibe to some good songs while working.

While there certainly are some more mindless tasks you can easily do while singing along to songs, it will destroy your productivity for tasks that require concentration and a lot of thinking. 

Fast-paced music can get your blood pumping and make you all fidgety. Lyrics catch and divert your attention from what you were originally thinking about. 

Remember: There is no such thing as multitasking; only a splitting of attention that significantly decreases your focus.

Luckily, there are a plethora of better options to choose from that will even support your productivity.

Lo-Fi music is a popular choice that can be described as non-distractive but silence filling ambiance music. 

Nature sounds are great, too, if you want to filter out the outside noise of your work-environment.

Binaural beats, on the other hand, are on an entirely different level. They are not only filling the silence or blending out environmental distraction, but they actively influence your brain waves (as long as you wear headphones). 

Why should you care about brain waves? Well, depending on our activity (sleeping, resting, meditating, focusing), our brain waves change. 

Binaural beats can help us to get into a focused flow full of alpha waves more easily. 

Read also: 35 Songs For Your Badass Boss Babe Playlist – Music Videos Included!

3. Working in a cluttered room

Clutter distracts. 

Not just the clutter on your desk right in your line of sight but also the mess all around the room you work in. 

It catches your attention when you look around, and even when you don’t see it, you know it’s there, which creates a feeling of having left tasks unfinished. 

So make sure to do a quick sweep through the room before you get down to work. 

4. Working in bed

The easiest way to trigger a habit is by being in the location that you’ve consciously or unconsciously designated to the habit. 

For example, if you tend to open your fridge every time you’re in the kitchen, you will feel the need to do so every time you enter the room. 

This automatic triggering can be a good or bad thing depending on the habit. 

For example, if you designate your bed only to sleeping, you will have a much easier time falling asleep as soon as you hit the pillow. 

On the flip side, you will automatically get tired when trying to do work in bed. Or you will have a harder time falling asleep because usually, you fight sleep while being in bed to do work. 

Also, you can hardly maintain a good posture while sitting in bed. 

So altogether, working in bed is one of the habits that destroy your productivity. 

5. Having notifications of any kind activated

Getting into a focused flow state for work is often difficult enough. The last thing you need is notifications popping up on your screen or making sounds and ripping your hard-fought-for attention away from work. 

So make sure to turn off all notifications – both the sound and the banners or popups. 

6. Consuming any kind of content in your breaks

I get it, you’ve worked or studied diligently, and now in your break, you want to do something that you actually enjoy doing – most likely Netflix, YouTube, social media, fanfictions, etc.

However, the problem is that consuming content like this will give your mind new things to think about as soon as your break ends. 

While trying to focus back on work, you will still be thinking about how that episode will continue or that Instagram image you saw. 

It is much easier to get back into the productive flow by taking a walk in your break or juggling or listening to music while dancing around a bit.

7. Not following a clear sleep schedule

Sleep is important not only for our physical health but also for our cognitive functions. 

If we want to do our best work, we need to be at our best, which means getting proper sleep. 

But not just that. It’s also about always sleeping at the same time. 

If you are used to sleeping until 9 am, it will take a few days until you are not tired anymore between 6 am and 9 am, even if you’ve got seven hours of sleep. 

That’s why sleeping in on weekends is an unproductive habit we should avoid. After all, your body doesn’t know that weekends have a different schedule compared to workdays. 

This is why by sleeping in, you weaken the habit of waking up at the same time you do during the week. 

Waking up quickly and energized is much easier if you have the same sleep schedule seven days a week. 

8. Focusing on aesthetics over functionality

I’m sure you’ve come across images of pretty study summaries on Instagram and Pinterest. 

These images often motivate students to study more and create summaries like that themselves. The problem is that creating such summaries usually takes way too much time compared to the study results they bring. 

Another example is stylish but uncomfortable outfits. It’s understandable to want to look good for work or school. Still, if the outfit is distracting you from actually being productive, it is not worth it. 

An example for entrepreneurs is designing every Pinterest pin individually instead of using templates. Trust me, that one gorgeous pin won’t get you the traffic. 

Focusing on aesthetics instead of functionality is one of the habits that destroy your productivity.

9. Eating junk food or drinking alcohol before work

Junk food and alcohol make you sluggish. You will have much more energy if you eat healthily and drink water before starting to do any work. 

Eating junk food is therefore one of the habits that destroy your productivity.

10. Starting to work when you have a lot on your mind instead of clearing it

Sometimes life gets in the way of our work sessions. A hectic day or a thought-provoking message can forcefully push us far away from anything akin to focus. 

It stays on our minds when we want to focus, and it makes us fidget when we want to sit still. 

If you try to be productive in such a state of mind, you will fail spectacularly and waste your time. 

Instead, make sure to take as long as you need to clear your mind. Journaling, taking a walk through nature, doing Yoga and meditation can help you. 

11. Focusing more on how long you work than what you do in that time

Parkinson’s law states that “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.”

That’s why giving yourself four hours a day to study and setting your Pomodoro timer doesn’t guarantee you will use that time productively. 

It’s just, if not more likely that you will half-heartedly work until the time runs out and then half-heartedly pat yourself on the back for doing your daily hours of studying. 

But imagine you were about to go on holiday and had to get the tasks done in only two hours. Chances are high this deadline would have motivated you sufficiently to accomplish the same amount of work in half the time.

It also shows that the time invested is not proportionate to the results you reap. 

For example, some companies have experimented with a four-day workweek. Surprisingly, the employees got the same amount of work done in four days that they initially took five days for. 

That’s why for optimal productivity, you should always challenge yourself to get your work done in a shorter amount of time. 

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Do you know any other habits that destroy your productivity? We always appreciate tips on how to do our work better. 

Also, what’s your biggest procrastination tool? Mine are fanfictions ^^’. 

Until next time, lovely Felicity Seekers!