Skip to content

A RIDICULOUSLY Productive Day in my Life

2021-01-20 · Vlog or day in the life · Ali · recording, 9:41 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Productivity and time (also: Health, sleep and habits, Learning and studying, Relationships and personal life, YouTube, writing online and creators) · mode: Playful and ironic · tags: His own products discussed, Sponsor segment present

In a self-mocking "ridiculously productive" lockdown day vlog, Ali has a concept-art lesson, writes about 700 of his 2,000 daily words for his book, works out an hour late, sees his orthodontist, runs Homework Club and a Part-Time YouTuber Academy peer-supporter call, has a coaching call with Chris Sparks, and drops his word goal to watch Friends.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Lockdown morning: waking up groggily, mouth tape and Invisalign off, coffee

  • ★ Ali wakes at 7.30 and, after ten minutes in bed, removes his mouth tape and his Invisalign braces before showering. — 00:00:00

00:00:29 — 8 a.m. art lesson with Alessandro in Procreate on the iPad

  • ★★ At 8 a.m. Ali has a Zoom art lesson with his teacher Alessandro, practising human anatomy in Procreate on the iPad, towards his 2021 goal of becoming decent at concept art to illustrate scenes from his favourite fantasy books. — 00:00:29 · iPad
  • ★★ Ali's breakfast of chicken sausage, eggs and beans is part of his drive to eat healthily in 2021, on the way, he jokes, to becoming a Gymshark athlete. — 00:00:29 · Gymshark

00:00:58 — Breakfast, a YouTube fix, and writing the book: 2,000 words a day, research on happiness and meaning

  • ★ Over breakfast Ali spends ten minutes watching videos by Kharma Medic and Graham Stephan, his fix of YouTube for the day. — 00:00:58
  • ★★★ Ali is writing a book and has set himself the goal of writing 2,000 words a day, usually in the mornings after his art lessons. — 00:00:58 · MacBook
  • ★★ Ali says his new AirPods Max, through which he listens to his study-with-me playlist on Spotify while writing, sound great but are a tad overpriced. — 00:01:27 · Spotify
  • ★★ For his book, Ali is doing a deep dive into social-science research on the similarities and differences between happiness and meaning. — 00:01:27
  • ★★ Ali says happiness and meaning overlap a lot as feelings, but most researchers agree they are subtly different. — 00:01:27

00:01:56 — Procrastinating on the phone, a late home workout, Tupperware macros and two Zoom calls

  • ★★ Ali ends his morning writing session for his book at 10.30, having written only around 700 words. — 00:01:56
  • ★★ Instead of the home workout in his calendar, Ali procrastinates on his phone for half an hour, so the workout starts an hour late, at 11.30. — 00:01:56
  • ★★ Ali's hour-long home workout: a warm-up circuit, then three sets of kettlebell squat press, decline push-ups and mountain climbers, and three sets of kettlebell deadlifts, single-arm rows and split squats. — 00:02:26
  • ★ During his workout Ali listens to The Pillars of the Earth, a historical fiction series he has started on Audible. — 00:02:26 · Audible
  • ★★ Ali's Tupperware lunch gives him 60 grams of protein, 50 grams of carbs and about 24 grams of fat, part of his attempt to get a six-pack in 2021. — 00:02:26

00:03:04 — Laundry, pizza, a new look for the wife quest, filming, the monthly mastermind call and the orthodontist

  • ★★ Before filming, Ali changes into a blue shirt and jeans, trying to dress less like a teenager and more like a man in his twenties, in pursuit of his 2021 goal of finding a wife. — 00:03:33
  • ★★ Every month Ali joins a two-hour mastermind call with friends and business associates, where each person has 15 minutes to talk through problems in their business and get the group's advice. — 00:03:33
  • ★★ Ali drives his car Hermione to Anglia Orthodontics, which provided his Invisalign aligners to improve his smile on the way to finding a wife; the orthodontist Dr Francis Scriven shaves some enamel off his teeth, and the treatment is a third of the way through. — 00:04:03

00:04:32 — Homework Club and the Part-Time YouTuber Academy peer supporters' call

  • ★★ Homework Club is a two-hour video-making co-working session for alumni of the Part-Time YouTuber Academy: 30 minutes on video topics, an hour of scripting and 30 minutes brainstorming titles and thumbnails, to generate new video ideas each week. — 00:04:32 · Part-Time YouTuber Academy
  • ★★ Ali and his team hold a call with the Part-Time YouTuber Academy's peer supporters to hear about students' problems and plan sessions for the second cohort, which starts in mid-February 2021. — 00:05:01 · Part-Time YouTuber Academy

00:05:32 — Diet dinner, The Office, a crepe, writing on ACT, and a coaching call with Chris Sparks

  • ★★ Ali says eating Tupperware meals on his calorie-restricted diet makes him feel depressed, but it will be worth it when he gets his six-pack. (playful) — 00:05:32
  • ★★ Over dinner Ali and his housemate Sheen watch The Office for the first time, after viewers suggested it in YouTube comments. — 00:06:09 · Sheen
  • ★★ In the evening Ali writes for his book for half an hour, researching the psychological counselling technique ACT. — 00:06:36
  • ★★ At 9.15 p.m. Ali has a performance coaching call with his friend and productivity coach Chris Sparks about his goals for 2021 and possible struggles in business and his personal life. — 00:06:36

00:07:05 — 11 p.m.: dropping the day's word goal for Friends, and a mock case against goals

  • ★★ At 11 p.m., watching Friends, Ali still needs 1,350 words to reach his 2,000 for the day but cannot be bothered, and plans to make it up the next day. (playful) — 00:07:05

00:08:20 — Brilliant sponsor read

  • ★★ Ali says the recent bull run of Bitcoin and Ethereum has helped him recoup some of the money he lost on Bitcoin in 2017, when its earlier bull run was followed by a massive crash. — 00:08:49

00:09:18 — More Friends and the sign-off

Humor (significant)

  • Ali wakes at 7.30 and stays in bed — 00:00:00

    “lying in bed for a few minutes, being a total waste man.”

  • After ten minutes of YouTube over his reheated breakfast, he heads back to being productive — 00:00:58

    “Don't I just love my life?”

  • His home workout starts an hour late — 00:01:56

    “And so I spend the next hour working my way towards becoming a Lululemon athlete.”

  • His housemate orders pizza while Ali is dieting — 00:03:04

    “My housemate Sheen, otherwise known as Lucifer, has ordered some pizza”

  • Having just restyled himself to find a wife, he reaches for more pizza — 00:03:33

    “I also get tempted by another slice of pizza which I promise is my last pizza of the year”

  • Hungry after a day of dieting, he orders dessert — 00:06:09

    “so i give in to the temptation and order a crepe with bananas and strawberries i need to lose weight”

  • Skipping his word count for Friends, he declares setting goals pointless — 00:08:01

    “and not burning out is more important at least that's what i've read on the internet”

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

People: Alessandro · Ali Abdaal's mother · Chris Sparks · Francis Scriven · Graham Stephan · Kharma Medic · Sheen

Projects: Homework Club · Part-Time YouTuber Academy

Works: Friends · The Office · The Pillars of the Earth

Organizations: Anglia Orthodontics · Brilliant · Gymshark · Lululemon

Concepts: acceptance and commitment therapy · mouth taping

Products: AirPods Max · Audible · Bitcoin · Ethereum · Invisalign · iPad · MacBook · Procreate · Spotify

Replies to

← Previous: My Top 10 Tips for Aspiring YouTubers · Next → My Favourite iPad Productivity Apps