If you were writing an essay, would you write one paragraph, then on another occasion, write another, and another. Imagine how hard it would be to finish this essay, and make it a good one. The essay would inevitably be incoherent and have no clear direction. If we wouldn’t do something as simple as write without looking back on what we have done, why do we live our lives like that?
I’ve mentioned the ‘weekly review’ previously, I had no idea what it was until probably a year ago. I don’t remember how I stumbled upon it initially but it was listening to Tim Ferriss that made me actually commit to it. I started doing a weekly review 3 months ago (almost) every week and it is probably the highest yield productivity change I’ve made in a long time.
What is a weekly review?
A weekly review is simply a reflection on the week that has passed. I sit down on a Sunday evening and look back through my calendar and write whatever comes to mind. If I’m stuck on what to write (which I was a lot early on), I just recount what I did, then I put in how it made me feel. Inevitably, I get side-tracked thinking of new ideas, remembering a good moment, or a bad moment which I then problem solve.
I’ve recently added some structure to my review with subheadings of “What went well last week,” “what didn’t go so well” and “what did I learn.” Following this freeform section I have a tick box where I am reminded to preview my calendar for the week, then a list to write actions based on the calendar, or more commonly, something I didn’t do in the week prior. The final part is my focus for the week, which can be more important goals or something broader.
It sounds like an effort, how does it help?
It does sound like a lot at first, but it honestly takes no more than 30 minutes at most, sometimes as little as 10 minutes. You can easily overestimate how much you’re able to get done in a day, and grossly underestimate how much you can achieve in a week, a month or a year. The weekly review is a way to set larger goals across the week, and identify the barriers to achieving those goals in the previous week. This reflection helps overcome future barriers, ultimately allowing to to achieve your goals, in a much shorter time frame. The weekly review takes the serendipity out of achieving, you don’t have to wait until you happen to remember that thing you were working on last week. Each week you look back, and build on the week gone by, fastracking whatever it is you want to achieve.
How to start?
The best thing to do is to just start, it’s so easy to look at all these techniques for being more productive and have all the tools for the job but not use them. Imagine you’re a builder and before nailing something together you wait until you’ve got a certain hammer which attenuates force 10% better than another, then you dont want to hit your thumb so you then wait until a gadget comes which protects your thumb. Before you know it, there wont be a nail to hit because someone with a basic hammer has just done it for you. That was a poor analogy but the message is simple, the tools you use are better than the perfect tool. Among photographers there is the classic adage “the best camera is the one with you.” The message is the same, just start.
Writing will be hard at first, but it gets easier after the first few sentences. I promise. If it doesn’t, let me know and I’ll write a personal apology.
Harrison Hansford 