7 Habits of Highly Unproductive Freelancers

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As a freelancer, you’re probably continuously trying to maximize your time and be as productive as possible.

Well this is your unlucky day because I’m going to distract you with this article about how you can do the exact opposite.

Behold: 7 habits of highly unproductive freelancers:

1. Spend an hour in bed after you wake up looking at things on your phone

Check your email the second your eyes open.

Then check Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and maybe even Pinterest.

Then go back and check your email again. Then check your other email. Then check Facebook again…just in case you missed something since the last time you checked it…

Before you know it, you will have wasted the morning 

2. Work on projects without any deadlines or milestones

Do a little jig in your head when the client says there is no deadline because you think hey less pressure, I’ll actually be able to think deep and hard on this one.

But the reality of no deadline means you prioritize all the stuff with deadlines and your no deadline projects remain at the bottom of your to-do list – indefinitely.

3. Don’t go outside. Develop a weird complex about going outside versus not going outside.

Tell yourself you’ll go outside the house at some point today but only after you get some work done. Proceed to procrastinate said work because you actually want to just go outside for a minute and get some air.

But tell yourself you can’t go outside until you get something done. Procrastinate more because you want to go outside. Then freak out when it starts getting dark outside because you just lost your chance to enjoy the day, outside.

Promise yourself the next day that you’ll go outside and actually end up doing it, then spend a lot of brain energy congratulating yourself for time managed well.

4. Panic about having to eat lunch

Don’t make lunch ahead of time and be annoyed by the fact that you have to stop everything you’re doing just to make and eat lunch. Have no plan for lunch and spend too much time trying to decide what to make. Put off lunch until 3pm. Become hangry and unproductive in the meantime.

5. Wear your pajamas to work

DEADLY SIN OF UNPRODUCTIVE SINS.

Don’t change out of your pajamas until 2 pm. Try to wear your glasses instead of your contact lenses because they’re better for your eyes and you actually quite like the way they look. But be held back productivity-wise by the literal glass between your face and your computer screen. And because you only wear your glasses at night and in the morning when you’re tired so it feels kinda like that, but in the middle of the day.

6. Insist on finishing something you can’t finish before doing anything else

Spend the whole day trying to brainstorm or strategize for a project on which you’re feeling completely blocked. Refuse to move on and work on something else until you get this out of the way. Spend all day free writing and trying to get it done but not actually getting anything done.

7. Watch a YouTube video…

Or two or three or FOUR HUNDRED because just one more can’t hurt, right?

Photo credit: Goldie Winston, 2013

The time management struggle is real in the freelancing world. Here are some of the top habits of unproductive freelancers. — Pin it!

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