5 No BS Ways to Become More Productive in 2025

Most productivity advice is either superficial, or solves a very specific problem for one person and is not generalizable to the majority of viewers.

There is no such thing as an ‘average’ level of productivity. The people that are productive in life tend to be very productive, and everyone else is usually not productive at all. This small % of people is responsible for most of the output in the world-big companies, major advancements, large movements, most content, etc.

So how do you achieve this? In this video I will share 6 no-BS productivity tips and models that actually work.

1.Environment Design

Humans are animals. We often forget this (thanks to the wonders of civilization), but in reality we respond to simple environmental constraints. Things that are easy get done more often; things that are hard get done less often.

Example: if you left out extra food for your dog or cat every day, they would eventually gain weight. They might not want to gain that weight, but since the food is in front of them, and it’s easy to consume, they’ll eventually do it. Animals are, for the large part, a a byproduct of their environment, and we are the same.

I audited my environment, and then consciously designed it to maximize my productivity. Some examples:

1. I noticed I would spend a lot of time rolling around in bed, neglecting to get up. This lost me at least 30-45 mins/day. So instead of mindlessly rolling around, I put my computer on my nightstand. Now I get to work an extra 30-45 mins.

2. I put a bright light next to my bed. I spent-$200-it is extraordinarily bright. When I wake up, I turn this on. Like an animal responding to their environment, I wake up much faster, and my circadian rhythm follows suit

3. I made my workspace comfortable. Since my workspace is comfortable, I spend more time on it.

4. I bought an extremely fast, expensive computer. Since my computer is more enjoyable to use, I spend more time on it.

5. Little hacks like this are all you need. They add up, and now I spend two extra hours on things that make me money.

2. Distance vs displacement.

One of the most useful mindset shifts is distance vs displacement.

1. Distance is the total amount travelled.

2. Displacement is how far you’ve moved from your origin.

Another way of looking at it: distance is the work you put in. Displacement is the output.

The only thing the world cares about is your ability to produce.

They don’t care how long it took you to get there. Nor do they give a shit how you did so. Your process does not matter-the only thing you will be judged on is your ability to move from point A to point B.

So, whereas most people walk a long path to get to a fairly short result (i.e, their distance is much greater than their displacement). we should look for ways to maximize the displacement while minimizing our distance traveled. Our goal is to walk in as straight a line possible from A to B while eliminating wasted movement.

When you do this consistently, you become much more productive.

3. Social shame/pre-commitment.

Humans are terrified of social shame. We know this on an intrinsic level-when somebody is watching, we tend to act ‘better’ than when we’re alone. So give yourself an audience. Announce your goals publicly. Put money on the line, Make failure painfully embarrassing. Shame understandably has negative connotations, but if you leverage it right you can achieve incredible things.

Small example: you tell your friend to meet you at the gym at

7:00am tomorrow. You don’t want to disappoint your friend-you would be ashamed-so you show up. This is used by personal trainers all over the world.

Medium example: you tell your client you’ll guarantee them 10

leads or their money back. You don’t want to disappoint your client-you did just guarantee them something, after all. So you put in many added hours to ensure they get what they paid for. This is Used by agencies and coaches all over the world.

Large example: you’re Elon Musk and you tell the world you’re going to back Donald Trump on live TV. If he loses, your reputation is toast. So you push extraordinarily hard to try to win. This is usad by billionaires all over the world.

4. Don’t delegate automate

A lot of people think the key to productivity is having teams of people that do everything for you.

But in general, humans are:

1. Expensive,

2. Inconsistent,

3. Fragile,

4. Require consistent upkeep (management work can eventually dwarf the time saved from delegating!)

I have dozens of small automations running constantly. They do tiny administrative functions that would otherwise take a whole team of people. Why am I able to focus my attention where it matters most Trevenue)? Because most of the small daily drains are taken care of!

And if they aren’t, I just ignore them. For real. I focus on the 1% that brings 99% of the rev.

A cheap script or a solid piece of software will never call in sick. You also have full control over them. Implement once and scale infinitely. Automation frees your brain for higher-level work.

5. Procrastinate by working.

I procrastinate all the time. But I do so in a more productive way than most: I procrastinate on one task with another task.

Sounds silly, but you can channel most of the energy that goes into avoiding task A by doing task B instead. And if task B is a revenue driver, you can end up getting quite a lot done.

Example:

You could procrastinate doing a project with clearing your email inbox. Latter is lower ROI, of course, but it’s still something you need to do.

procrastinated creating a community (very high ROI activity) by publishing more YouTube videos (slightly lower ROI activity).

Still made me a lot of money. Bonus points: they were symbiotic.

Bonus

6. Do retrospectives. But account for lag.

Your approach is never perfect. Like in our distance vs displacement example, we should always be looking for the straightest line path, and the only way to do that is by regularly reflecting on our direction and our speed.

I call these “retrospectives”. They make up a key part of my program, Maker School, and have made many people many thousands of dollars.

The Issue: most people do retrospectives too often. Like me, you probably love analyzing (and forming opinions about) your progress. But when you do it too quickly, you won’t have formed enough data for your decision to be meaningful. And if you make a call to, say, stop what you were doing-because it hasn’t generated any results-you are very often doing this too early.

Results lag behind Inputs. It takes time for things to occur. When you send an email, people have to check their inbox. When you apply for a job, your hiring manager has to see it. When you create a piece of content, it takes time to be indexed. Example:

1. When I started writing four years ago, I wrote one blog post per day for thirty days.

2. At the end of my thirty days, I had just a few hundred views. Most of them left my blog instantly. So I had spent-one hour per 4 views. Perhaps understandably, I decided this was not a worthwhile pursuit and quit.

3. A year later, many of the blog posts I had written the previous year were now ranking. I was getting hundreds of views per day, I got a request to be on a magazine, Popular Mechanics.

TLDR: results lag behind inputs, and had I known this eartier I would be much richer.