Complete What You Start! How To Stop Doing Things Halfway

Make it a productive day! ™

Snooze Your Way to Success. BusinessWeek - New York, NY, USA. Getting more sleep while living the rest of your busy life requires excellent time-management skills. -more-

Workers feel pressure from bosses to not stay home sick. San Jose Mercury News (subscription) - San Jose, CA, USA. Going to work sick will affect your productivity. -more-

Maintaining Energy Throughout the Workday: Ensuring Productivity with Proper Self-Care and Wellness

How much energy and vitality do you have throughout the day to accomplish the things you want to do? Recent studies have revealed we have the potential to dramatically impact our productivity by paying closer attention to our behaviors around health. In other words, we eat too much, drink too much, don't exercise enough, work too much, and don't sleep enough to be productive. Some studies suggest that upwards of 70 percent of doctor visits are prompted by our own choices in these areas. This seminar will guide you in making the choices necessary to give you vitality and productivity every day!

Course Objectives

1. Get adequate sleep each night, so you're not sleepy during the day.
2. Get sufficient exercise.
3. Practice healthy eating habits.
4. Use all your allotted vacation time each year.
5. Pamper yourself on a regular basis.
6. Monitor the noise level in your office, so it's conducive to productivity.
7. Ensure that your workspace is comfortable and ergonomically correct.
8. Take a lunch break every day.
9. Drink the proper amount of water each day.
10. Reduce or eliminate all unhealthy addictions from your life.

Dear Laura,

I just finished your book "Leave the Office Earlier" which I picked up last week. I found it very sharp, insightful and helpful in giving myself new focus at this year comes to a close.

I particularly liked the first three chapters, in which you lay out specific exercises to help the reader define their values. I know that for me, completing these exercises, even though they may have seemed tedious, gave me tremendous satisfaction once I took the time to work on them. Thank you for you work in this common sense approach to modern time management.

As an Account Supervisor in Advertising software, and specifically as a woman, I appreciated the perspective you gave throughout the chapters. Your anecdote on page 248 is a perfect paradigm of how many women, possibly even the majority of women, hold themselves to a standard of superwoman-like strength and stamina, which is almost comical and certainly impractical.

It is this story in particular which prompted me to write. You seem to have an adept understanding of this pressure, to perform at such a peak level of proactive energy, both in our personal and professional lives. In particular, I think there is a subject relevant to this that has not been explored fully, which I would love to read a book about-

Women in the scenario described above, must get up each day and launch into each task as a warrior facing every challenge that can come her way, just as I am sure you do. We manage huge pieces of business, millions of dollars, setup meetings, pursue opportunities, stay aggressive all day, pushing and pushing to further our careers and fighting to survive.

And then, suddenly, when we shift into our personal lives, we have to do a complete 180-degree turn, in dealing with men. Having a husband who is also a coworker I am sure you are especially aware of the opposing faces women are expected to show at work, and towards men (at least if they expect not to crush a man's ego) in their personal lives. Women are still expected to be unassuming, humble, and generally let a man take the role of the aggressor.

After recently breaking off a long-term relationship, I read dozens of relationship self help books and bestsellers, (in addition to books such as yours). It seems generally acknowledged wisdom that men like to be dominant at least on some level, or they quickly lose interest in a woman. Both classics such as "The Rules" and recent bestsellers like "He's Just Not That Into You" beat us over the head with the notion that women push a man away unless they let him make the moves.

This was probably much easier for women such as my mother to accept, who may have worked several jobs over her lifetime but never had a corporate job where the division between work and demeanor were at such odds. For me personally, I feel awkward and childish after having sat at a table all day with clients presenting proposals of why they should entrust their money and their products to my expertise and brilliant ideas, then suddenly have to hold myself back from suggesting ideas for dates, bragging about the deal I just closed, calling men first, or proposing where the relationship should be going.

I think women need guidance on this transition, or at least more sympathy to this specific problem. When I think about possibly going after my MBA next year, I think to myself "how will this affect my dating life?" "Will I start lying about it to avoid scaring men off?" "Have I just made things that much harder for myself" "is it worth it?" As much as I love to talk about my own accomplishments and success, I constantly remind myself not to on dates. And from where I sit, boys don't make passes at girls with MBAs.

Perhaps you have a different take on my problem; perhaps you have not found it to be such a pointed struggle, or perhaps you have different ideas on approaching dating. I would certainly love to hear any thoughts you have on the subject, any plans to write any related books, or other sources of inspiration you could point me too.

You mentioned in the book that you gave free advice on the phone, so I have hoped that perhaps you would indulge a reader's email request.

Best wishes for your writing and your continued success,

Elizabeth W.
Age 26
New York City