Give me 7 minutes and I’ll Make You Dangerously Productive

The definition 99% of people use for productivity is dumb as f.

Everyone thinks it's about putting in crazy hours, grinding non-stop and checking more boxes.

But that's not productivity.

That's burnout with a to-do list.

And no matter how many apps you download or planners you buy, you're still drowning in tasks barely moving the needle.

Because real productivity isn't about doing more, it's about doing less.

I've coached thousands of high performers through this exact shift and I've been through it myself.

I've scaled and exited multiple companies, built teams that generated millions every month.

And none of that happened because I worked 18 hours a day or repeated daily affirmations in the mirror.

It happened because I learned how to build a system that made me dangerously productive.

And it's your lucky day because I'm going to give you the exact roadmap so you can use it too.

That way you won't just be productive, you'll be f ⁇ ing unstoppable.

Welcome to the Martel method.

I went from rehab at 17 to building a $100 million empire and being a Wall Street Journal best-selling author.

In this podcast, I'll show you exactly how to build a life and business you don't grow to hate.

My best-selling book, Buy Back Your Time, is out now.

Grab a copy at buybackyourtime.com or at any of your preferred online retailers.

First things first, cut the crap.

Forget optimizing.

First, delete what doesn't matter.

If it's not driving towards your most important goals, it's dead weight.

So here's how you do it.

First off, you pick one goal.

I remember listening to this productivity guy and he said, hey, pull out a piece of paper, write all your goals on that piece of paper and pick the one goal.

If you got it done, it would make all the other goals come true.

And then write that goal on the back side of the paper and then write all the projects and things you could do to make that goal come true.

That is your focus.

Pull up your calendar.

Look at a full typical week.

Then one by one, ask yourself, does this move me closer to my five-year goal?

If yes, circle it green.

Then ask yourself, does it pull me away from my five-year goal?

This is playing video games.

This is hanging out with friends that don't support your goals.

goals.

If it's a yes, circle it in red.

Now cut the red ruthlessly.

The most successful people I know can say no.

They know what they're focused on.

They know what they get to get done and they don't allow things to distract them from getting it done.

If it's not moving you forward, it's holding you back, period.

Now, I actually go way deeper on this in my book, Buy Back Your Time.

There's a whole section dedicated to exactly how to spot and cut the stuff that's slowing you down.

So once you've got all the BS out of the way, you've got a new problem.

Now everyone and everything wants a piece of your freaking attention.

So with that in mind, you have to protect your time.

You've cleared the junk.

So from now on, guard your time like it's gold.

You know, I always say, if you buy back your time, make sure it stays sold.

So here's a couple easy ways you can implement this today.

First off, what you have to do is block out times for focus work in your calendar and treat them as if they were meetings.

You wouldn't cancel on other people.

The other thing is you have to get rid of all the distractions.

I live in the DND world.

Do not disturb.

If somebody needs to get a hold of me, they can find me.

You have to treat your time like it's worth $1,000 an hour or more.

Because if you don't, it won't.

If you don't value your time, people won't value your time.

All right, so you've cleared the crap, locked in your time, but if you want to grow faster, go farther.

And to do it without burning out, you need leverage.

How?

It's time to multiply yourself.

This is no longer about just saving time.

It's about building leverage through delegation systems and people.

But dan, I don't have enough money to hire all these people to delegate the task to.

Guess what?

You don't need a team on day one.

You just start small.

You look for leverage.

Think about it.

Use AI automation for repetitive tasks.

Do the work to learn the skill to outsource that stuff.

Outsource low energy tasks like meal prep, laundry, cleaning your house.

You can pay a little bit of money to have people do that.

As you grow, buy back more time, then scale it into hiring support and eventually a team.

There's so much opportunity to get leverage without adding labor.

Real productivity isn't doing more.

It's doing less and achieving 10x more.

First, let's look at your calendar again.

Spot the tasks that repeat over and over every week, every month, and ask yourself, could someone else or something else do this and get the same result?

Now, I know you're thinking, nobody can do it as good as me.

Trust me, they can.

Next, record yourself doing the task.

I call this the camcorder method.

Once you've got the recording, you take it and then you use AI to turn it into into steps.

The AI builds the system as you go and then you make the delegation effortless.

After that, find tools that can simplify or automate it.

Guess where you find them?

Ask AI.

Example, AI writing draft email replies to everything that comes in.

So you just have to review and hit send.

That'll allow you to be more productive than you ever thought possible.

Finally, fill that freed up time with needle moving work.

Focus on the things only you can do that light you up and make you the most money that move things forward fast.

Before we get back to the episode, if you want to jumpstart your week with my top stories and tactics, be sure to subscribe to the Martel Method newsletter.

It's where you'll elevate your mindset, fitness, and business in less than five minutes a week.

Find it at martelmethod.com.

Here's the thing.

Everything we talked about is great, but if you really want to take all of this to the next level, you have to absolutely make sure that you win tomorrow today.

Use mornings as your most strategic block of the day to direct the machine you just built.

That means you have to start your day the night before.

Every night when I go to bed, after I listen to my wife tell me about her day, I sit there and I review my calendar and make sure that my morning is focused on the most important activities that are going to drive my goals for the year, for the quarter.

forward.

And I know you have life going on and it's tough.

But I remember a decade ago, I was talking to my dad.

You know, those conversations with a parent that they make you feel like you're a freaking idiot?

He kind of made me feel that way.

He was asking me questions and I didn't like my answers.

And the truth was, is that he was right.

I wasn't taking my life seriously.

I took my foot off the gas.

I was being complacent.

Even though I became a multi-millionaire, I wasn't focused on my potential.

And I made a commitment that day for the next day.

I can't control my results right now.

I can just decide what I do with my time.

And I woke up early.

See, when we win the first hour, we win the whole f ⁇ ing day.

Most people lose the day before it even begins.

So here's how to make sure that's never you again.

First, set a nighttime alarm.

Pick a time to shut down and protect your energy.

Get to bed early.

The best things happen by going to bed early.

Then you have to prep your environment.

Your willpower will never outweigh your environment.

Lay out the clothes to go to the gym.

Prep your breakfast.

Eliminate any morning distractions or friction.

You want to get those early wins.

Then write down the top three priorities for tomorrow.

Go to bed knowing exactly when you wake up, what you're going to focus on and get done.

Then we wake up and we eat the frog.

Mark Twain talks about this concept of eating the frog, which is if you start the day doing the hardest thing possible, the rest of the day will feel super easy.

Here's what's crazy is that the thing you want lives on the other side of what you've been avoiding.

Finally, block your first 90 minutes of deep work.

No meetings, no notifications, no inbox, no messaging, no social media.

Focus on the number one bottleneck in your life that if you solve, everything gets better.

After all of that, trust me, if you do this, productivity won't look different.

It'll feel different.

Less chaos, more clarity, no more burning out.

There's too many people consuming and talking and learning and thinking.

They call themselves visionaries, but they don't know how to translate the energy to the rubber that hits the road.

Everything I have in my life is the result of learning how to take all the crazy ideas I have and translate it into execution.

When you do that, you will feel unf ⁇ ing stoppable.

Thanks for listening to the Martel Method.

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