Asian Efficiency

If you’ve ever spent an afternoon reading productivity articles instead of doing actual work, this episode is for you. Thanh breaks down the four signs you’ve fallen into the productivity content trap, shares a simple audit to catch yourself in the act, and gives you one rule that turns any tip into real behavior change.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

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How would you know if you’d never actually experienced deep focus? Dan Clark, CEO of Brain.fm, says that’s the most common thing people write in to tell him — they thought they knew what concentration felt like, right up until they didn’t.

In this encore episode, Dan breaks down the science behind functional music: how neural phase locking syncs your brain to a focus state in three to seven minutes, why lyrics quietly sabotage your flow, and the simple focus sprint setup he recommends for anyone trying it for the first time.

Start with a free trial at shopify.com/tps.

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Learn more about how Notion can support your business at notion.com/tps.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

You’re busy all day but still feel like you’re not getting enough done. The culprit isn’t your to-do list — it’s hidden workflow friction. In this episode, Thanh and Brooks walk you through a practical Workflow Friction Audit: how to spot the invisible drains like context switching, setup overhead, unclear handoffs, and rework — and how to eliminate them with templates, batching, automation, and clearer decision rules. Small fixes, massive compounding results.

Masterclass.com/TPS for at least 15% off any annual membership.

Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free.

See what ElevenAgents can do for your specific workflows. Start with a demo at elevenlabs.io/tps.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

Rigid time-blocking sounds great in theory, but it falls apart the moment real life shows up. In this episode, Thanh shares five adaptive planning methods that preserve your intentions without making you feel behind before lunch. You will learn flexible focus blocks, rolling Top 3 priorities, time theming, buffer blocks, and energy-based planning.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

Get 20% off your first order: dripdrop.com and use promo code tps.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

You’ve read the books, watched the videos, and tried the apps — but your output hasn’t changed. In this episode, Thanh and Brooks break down why consuming productivity content can become its own form of procrastination. They cover optimization theater, endless tool switching, note hoarding, and planning as avoidance — and give you a simple audit to figure out if your “learning” is actually moving the needle or just feeding a dopamine loop.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

Get 20% off your first order: dripdrop.com and use promo code TPS.

Masterclass.com/TPS for at least 15% off any annual membership.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

Your AI tools keep promising to save you time — so why do you feel more buried than ever? We have a blunt answer: the tools were never the problem. You’ve been bolting AI onto a system that was already broken, like turbocharging a car with a flat tire.

This Wisdom Wednesday, we lay out a different way to think about it — one that changes where AI actually belongs in your day, and where it never will. Ten minutes. One shift. Give it a listen.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

Most productivity systems fail not because you lack discipline — but because you borrowed someone else’s constraints. In this episode, we break down why copying another person’s tool stack or workflow is a recipe for frustration, and walk you through a better build process: starting with your workload reality, energy patterns, and review cadence. You’ll learn how to customize the friction points of a proven framework instead of reinventing everything from scratch.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

Make the switch! MINTMOBILE.com/PRODUCTIVITY.

Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

Why do 65% of employees say AI makes them more productive, but only one in ten say it actually changed how they work? That gap comes down to a single skill—and the people who have it are quietly reclaiming 15 to 20 hours a week.

This Wisdom Wednesday, we break down the three levels of AI fluency and the simple audit that shows you exactly where you’re stuck. AI won’t fix a broken workflow—it just amplifies whatever you’ve already got. Here’s how to make it amplify the right things.

Learn more about how Notion can support your business at notion.com/tps.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

Rigid time-blocking sounds great in theory—until your 10 AM deep work block gets hijacked by an urgent meeting and you feel behind before lunch. In this episode, Thanh and Brooks break down why traditional time-blocking fails and share 5 adaptive planning methods that actually survive real life: flexible focus blocks, rolling daily Top 3, time theming, buffer blocks, and energy-based planning. Your calendar should preserve your intent, not punish you for being human.

Masterclass.com/TPS for at least 15% off any annual membership.

Make the switch! MINTMOBILE.com/PRODUCTIVITY.

See what ElevenAgents can do for your specific workflows  Start with a demo at elevenlabs.io/tps.

Learn more about how Notion can support your business at notion.com/tps.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!

What are you actually building when you chase a goal that takes years to reach? Most of us measure progress by whether we got the thing — the promotion, the number, the car in the driveway. But that scorecard misses the part that compounds. This encore episode gives you a better way to read your own progress, so the goals you’re grinding on right now pay off even when the outcome is slower or smaller than you hoped.

You’ll learn why setbacks are data rather than verdicts, how to make decisions when every dollar and hour counts, and what actually carries forward from one accomplished goal into the next one. Ten minutes, and you’ll walk away with a clearer sense of what you’re really earning — and why the next impossible thing on your list will feel more possible than this one did.

Get 20% off your first order: dripdrop.com and use promo code tps.

Visit www.asianefficiency.com for more productivity tips and tactics.

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Listen to this episode (MP3)

If you enjoyed this episode, follow the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Overcast, Pocket Casts or your favorite podcast player. It’s easy, you’ll get new episodes automatically, and it also helps the show. You can also leave a review!