How to be more productive

Getting things done isn’t working all day at 100 miles an hour. 【小题1】. And the following tips can definitely help you.

【小题2】

Smaller tasks like answering emails are “shallow work”. Try to be more conscious of what your shallow tasks are, and give yourself permission to block them out for a while so you can focus on the important tasks that require “deep work”.

Call it a day

For good productivity, be strict about when your working day is over, and when you get to the end of your planned work session, ease yourself into a more relaxed state. Look through your unfinished work. 【小题3】. Then close that textbook or laptop and say something out loud like “Shutdown complete!” After that? Have some fun. Give your mind the rest it’s earned.

Find your top level goal

【小题4】. Find the big thing that we could call your life’s purpose, like inspiring others, or helping people in society. Put that at the top. On the next level you’ll have mid-level goals like passing an exam. The goals below-it-should all feed into your top-level. They’ll be smaller, more practical things — perhaps writing an email, or doing some research. If they don’t help with achieving your top goal, then get rid of them!

Make your breaks smarter

Time-management master Francesco Cirillo says that for every 25 minutes of intense concentration, you should take five off to do nothing at all, which gives the brain time to recover and keeps your productivity high. 【小题5】. Move around, stare out of a window.

When starting college, most students enjoy a week’s stay on campus before classes actually begin. What should you do with that time? Below are several tips to ease yourself into college life.

Participating in Campus Welcome Activities

Most universities host welcome events before the academic year officially begins, including freshmen orientations, campus picnics, and entertainments like concerts.

Participating in such events is a great way to learn about school facilities and understand campus culture: What do students do for fun? What are their favorite classes? What is the history of your university? It can help you observe campus life outside the classroom.

Exploring Campus

Getting to know where essential campus resources are—such as the student advising center, psychological services, and the tutoring center, will make your first few weeks on campus a lot easier, because you won’t have to look for them while still getting used to your classes.

Take some time to check out the buildings where your classes will be held. This will prevent you from getting lost in the first few days of classes and familiarize you with how long it takes to get from place to place. If you’re worried about taking classes one after another in different buildings, a quick test run won’t hurt. That way, you will avoid potential time delays in getting to your classes.

Starting a Routine

Before getting too excited about all of the fun things you will be able to do during the week, remember that you do have a pretty big schedule change coming up. Starting classes means being in different places at different times, so it’s a great idea to start getting used to that routine right this week.

What helps you most is to schedule your sleep. Following the planned time will ensure you have enough sleep to get to those early classes and stay wide awake.

If you have other daily routines, such as exercising or talking on the phone with family, work those into your day-to-day life before classes start so that you get a better idea of how they fit in with your schedule.

So, do you want to know how to read classic books? Maybe you are excited to deal with classic literature but you don’t know where to start. 【小题1】 Here are some tips for enjoying classic literature and helping you get started.

Slow down the pace. The biggest difference between modern literature and classic literature is the pace. Modern reading can often feel like a short race. 【小题2】 If you try to apply short race techniques to a long distance run you will get tired pretty quickly. Well, the same is true with reading classic books.

【小题3】 One of the challenges when you start to read classics book is the language style. Words and phrases that are out of date or no longer relevant can make the writing difficult to understand. As it’s just not the way things are written or what is being talked about, it is common to jump over concepts that we don’t understand or words that we’ve never come across before. But, the key to reading classic books and enjoying them is taking time to understand them. So don’t shy away from looking things up.

Listen to the audio(有声的)book. Sometimes the best way to devote yourself to a classic book is to listen to it. Many classic books were intended to be read aloud. Books used to be very expensive, so people shared them. This meant that a family might gather together to listen to a few chapters every night. 【小题4】

Choose your favourite. Finally, the key to reading classic books and actually enjoying them is to choose one that actually appeals to you. Classic Books can get mixed up into a single genre(流派)“Classic”. 【小题5】 Think about what you already love reading and look for books that suit your interest.