We all strive to be more productive. But how? It was my dream to write a cookbook for kids, but with my job and family occupying all my time, I didn’t think I’d ever finish my passion project. But I found a way.
I’m Crystal Hankins, and I haven’t slept in three weeks. That’s because I practice Sleepless Productivity.
Whatever your work, you can get more of it done if you don’t sleep—and I can train you in this simple way of getting more hours out of your day through my patented Sleepless Productivity method. Here’s a peek at how it works:
Night One: For your first night, work in 20-minute increments, and alternate with 20-minute walks. This helps you maintain attention and wakefulness. It’ll take some effort, but a little caffeine goes a long way!
Night Two: It’s the second night that gets tricky. That’s when the bats come.
Dozens of bats will start flying over your head and swooping down at your face. And no matter how many people say they aren’t really there, you’ll need to dodge them so that they don’t get stuck in your hair and derail your focus.
Night Three: By night three, you’ll have overcome the need to fight sleep. You’re in the zone now! Now you’ve got all the time you need to throw silverware at the bats on your ceiling and start getting more work done.
You’ve now broken through to a sleepless mode of life. Get ready to make progress on that masterpiece of yours, to swat at the bats roaming your home with a pool skimmer, then start the morning with a sense of accomplishment. This must be how the billionaires do it!
You'll find how unnecessary sleep actually is. Never before will you twitch with so much productivity. Put that new, unnerving energy into fulfilling a lifelong dream, or even a new goal: I suggest making a bat-trap out of that mattress you don't need anymore. It'll keep the bats at bay for at least an hour while you put your nose back to the grindstone.
The fact is, the mind doesn't need rest. It needs to be engaged in a task, like building a barricade in your workspace to isolate yourself and keep out all distractions. Not to keep out bats though—they still get in somehow! Who in your family has betrayed you and let in the bats? These are the questions you'll have time to obsess over now!
Sounds too simple, right? “All I have to do is stay awake and attend to multiple bat bites that no one else can see? Sign me up!”
It’s not all easy-street, though. In my weeks of no sleep, I’ve finished my book, but I’ve encountered the following common challenges:
- Zookeepers who won’t take the bats you’ve caught: If the sack of bats is empty, then why is it wet with blood?
- Doctors refusing to give you rabies shots: Now who’s anti-vax?
- Loved ones trying to catch you in a blanket to get you to sleep: Not everyone will be on board with your new productive life.
- Accusations of stealing equipment from animal control: These are true.
- Procrastination: Be sure to set deadlines!
But it’s all worth it. Just ask Tabitha Knight, a fellow up-and-coming entrepreneur who went sleepless:
“When I started my own business, I needed all the time I could get. So I followed Crystal's methods and went sleepless, and got my online antique store up and running in a week!… I haven’t faced any bats, though. But I am often chased by a large rolling boulder… I hear it now… I need to get back to my hole! If I’m not in my hole, it’ll squish me again!”
Bats for some, boulders for others—but endless productivity for all! You find that hole Tabitha, and make another winning website while you’re in it!
And me? I've already started on my next project: a sequel to my book Healthy Meals, Healthy Kids. It's called How To Evade Sonar: What The Bats Don’t Want You To Know, and I've completely abandoned the concept of the first book to write something a little more relevant to our increasingly bat-infested lives.
Have you heard of this “sonar?” It took me a while to figure out how they were finding me in even the darkest of cellars and abandoned tunnels, but bats can use sounds to search in the dark and to tell you things with their minds. My new book details how a simple skull thickening procedure and a 500-pound suit of sand can help deflect the bats’ echolocation and thought-commands. And for fans of the first book, there’s a new tasty cheesy broccoli recipe in there too!
These kinds of creative breakthroughs don't happen from spending eight hours in bed every night like the old Crystal used to do. She got nothing done. But the new me is an achiever! And I want you too to achieve your dreams by not sleeping.
Sleepless Productivity seminar this Sunday at the Downtown St. Louis Marriott. Bring your night vision goggles and a notebook for brainstorming.