The 80 - 20 rule

Do you want to learn how to maximize your time so that most, if not all of your results, will come from the smallest amount of effort? Then allow me to introduce you to the 80-20 rule.

The 80-20 rule simply states that in any area of our lives, literally 80 percent of our fruits are derived from only 20 percent of doing “what matters”. In other words, there is only a very small portion of all that we do each day, regardless of the situation, that brings us the “higher return” so to speak.

Most people have been programmed from birth to constantly be spending most of their efforts on unproductive activities. They get frantically involved in a lot of stuff without ever really getting around to thinking about why they are involved in such activities. And it should not be a surprise that these people are constantly stressed out and deprived of time in their lives.

You need to control your focus. Employ your energy on the actions and tasks that matter to you. Having compelling goals or a definite major purpose (as Napoleon Hill calls it) will vastly improve your ability to focus your energy and your efforts.

Second, you must understand that anything that matters the most should never be at the mercy of activities that matter the least. Because the probability is high that you are spending up to 80 percent of your time on low-priority activities, your next step is to reassess how much time you should be spending on those activities. In order to make maximum use of your time, you must work hard to do away with as many of these low-priority activities as possible.

Once you have cleared out the stuff that does not bring you the best returns, it is not time to turn your attention to the few things in your life that are bringing the most, and spend most of your time just on those few high-priority activities. The objective is to maximize results from the areas of great surpluses and to bail out of those activities that drain you of having your desires of making more money with less work.

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