I don’t think this is the best solution for everyone, but it really helped my productivity. I’d never worked in an office until November 2021, and wasn’t expecting it to have the difference it did.
(I think things like FocusMate also work for people and do some of the same things, but I never got into the habit.)
If you show up more than 2 mins late your session is cancelled, meaning you’ll kind of disappoint the person on the other end of the call, and you have to wait another 13 minutes to get started. That’s a big motivation to show up and get started!
During the session, there’s someone else expecting you to make progress in the next 25/55/75 minutes. I feel way more (healthy) pressure to actually make progress when there’s expectations of a stranger (compared to e.g. a colleague or friend)
There’s a bunch of people interested in EA on the platform, but not so many that you always match with EAs. That means you’ll have an interesting mix of EA and non-EA chats (with people from around the world!) in breaks
Some things you might dislike:
Sessions only start every 15 minutes
There’s only a 3 free matches per week (but I find the subscription totally worth it—coming from someone who doesn’t have any other productivity boost subscriptions)
You’re on camera with loads of strangers, so there’s not much privacy
I used to work from home, and would schedule in Focusmate calls for most of my day. I recently started working from an office, and I now use Focusmate when no one else is in (usually to get my day started, or to help me get me through things if I need to work late).
Try working from an office or a coworking space
I don’t think this is the best solution for everyone, but it really helped my productivity. I’d never worked in an office until November 2021, and wasn’t expecting it to have the difference it did.
(I think things like FocusMate also work for people and do some of the same things, but I never got into the habit.)
Focusmate works incredibly well for me!
Some things I really like:
If you show up more than 2 mins late your session is cancelled, meaning you’ll kind of disappoint the person on the other end of the call, and you have to wait another 13 minutes to get started. That’s a big motivation to show up and get started!
During the session, there’s someone else expecting you to make progress in the next 25/55/75 minutes. I feel way more (healthy) pressure to actually make progress when there’s expectations of a stranger (compared to e.g. a colleague or friend)
There’s a bunch of people interested in EA on the platform, but not so many that you always match with EAs. That means you’ll have an interesting mix of EA and non-EA chats (with people from around the world!) in breaks
Some things you might dislike:
Sessions only start every 15 minutes
There’s only a 3 free matches per week (but I find the subscription totally worth it—coming from someone who doesn’t have any other productivity boost subscriptions)
You’re on camera with loads of strangers, so there’s not much privacy
I used to work from home, and would schedule in Focusmate calls for most of my day. I recently started working from an office, and I now use Focusmate when no one else is in (usually to get my day started, or to help me get me through things if I need to work late).
If you’re joining Focusmate, consider also joining the EA group on Focusmate, as @Lizka mentioned!