How I Use My Ears To Be More Productive

I’m always striving to be more productive so I can laze around and have more free time.

My quest to be a gentleman of leisure involves quite a lot of technology. Most of the apps I use are related to writing and note-taking, but today, I am going to discuss what I ram down my ear holes to make myself more productive.

There are two main things I use – one is a blend of software and science, and the other is a blend of software and cunningly designed hardware. Combine the two and I suddenly find myself 38.4% more prolific. Give or take 30%.

Brain.fm does clever stuff with your noggin and ears

I’ve used Brain.fm for years after I kept reading articles about how awesome the app is and decided to give it the trial a trial. I had done a ton of research – aka Reddit forums – into the best things to listen to promote focus while writing, and Brain.fm and game soundtracks came out top.

Game soundtracks are awesome, and I still listen to them a lot. But when I first gave Brain.fm a proper chance, I found the words I was writing positively gushed onto the page. If you know anything about ‘flow state’ – this put me almost straight into it. It’s awesome.

What Brain.fm does, or at least claims it does, is use science to help with productivity, creativity, focus, meditation, and a whole lot more. There are lots of options, but I have mostly been using focus for deep work.

And it has worked a charm. I am very easily distracted and tend to procrastinate at any given opportunity. But when I start a pomodoro then hit play on a ‘30 min deep work’ Brain.fm session, I write solidly and prolifically for whole period. I prefer ‘cinematic’ background sounds myself, but they all seem good.

I opted for the $49.99 annual option – and I’m tight with money. That is how well it has been working for me. There is something about the sounds and tunes you get that just seems to work better than anything else I have tried. And I’ve tried quite a few.

If you like the sound of Brain.fm you can also get a discount by using PROMO CODE: JasonWardWriter and get 20% off! Embiggen your noggin! (This seems like a good time to mention that this post has affiliate links.

Funnel Brain.fm into your ear holes with AirPods Pro 2 and you’re magically more productive

I guess you have probably heard of the AirPods Pro 2, but may be on the fence about them. These were my first Apple headphones and just- wow. Previously, I had been using the superb Sony WH-1000 series of headphones, both the over-ear (despite mild headaches) and in-ear options and they were great. But they started to cut out occasionally and the battery started to die.

I had picked Sony as it worked well with the Microsoft laptop and Samsung phone I had been using. But by the time my old headphones died, I was all in on Apple. I had read incredibly glowing reviews of the Apple AirPods Pro (2nd Generation) and thought I would switch. Being drawn further into the warm, loving, and slightly stifling Apple ecosystem just made sense.

The Airpods don’t just pipe the soothing and productive tones of Brain.fm, they also block out other humans. Other humans are generally annoying. Until everyone reads quietly all day and only chats in the pub, I need noise cancelling headphones to get stuff done when I leave my fortress of solitude and mix with the proles. I should add that the Sony headphones were great at that too. But if you have an Apple phone, I’d say go the AirPod route.

There are rumours that a new 3rd generation model will come out later this year. But I’m a big fan of impulse buying. You can check out the current Airpods here.

Try out both and see if they work for you

Everyone is different, so I’d suggest finding out if the above works for you. Frankly, there are a lot of decent headphones with noise-cancelling. If you have an Apple phone, then go for Airpods – they are as good as nearly everything else out there and it works better in an Apple environemt, especially if you have more that one device.

But when it comes to sound, give Brain.fm a go. You can try it for free for a couple of days and you might help unlock ‘flow’ state faster. That is well worth the price for something that might make you more productive.

And as I said before – click using this link and use PROMO CODE: JasonWardWriter and you’ll get 20% off. Bargain.

So there you go. It might have been a weird title for an article, but it is accurate. Good luck.