How I 2X my Productivity and Well-being in 2025

Context

2025 has been an amazing year so far, largely thanks to a new time (theme) management system I designed & implemented. When people asked me about this, I’ve shared with a few friends and often get an awe-inspiring reaction. After taking a long hiatus from public writing, I thought this would be a good topic to share — in hopes to help us all continue 2025 with high-agency, poise, and power.

Theme Management

Time management, GTD, energy management, you’ve heard it all. When I sat down end of 2024 in front of my computer and thought about “How am I possibly going to do all that I want to do while maintaining and growing my body, mind, and spirit in a long term sustainable and compounding way?”

None of these were going to really work for me, so I’ve designed a daily theme management system with high intentionality, flexibility, and strategic incentive stacking.

The Problem

As someone who started multiple projects involving tech, physical businesses, and content creation, I often found myself constantly switching between different priorities. This frequent context switching comes at a high cost — research suggests it takes 30 minutes to fully re-engage after each switch.

Even when distractions are “important,” the cognitive cost remains high. This constant shifting prevented me from achieving deep focus and left me feeling scattered.

Designing a new system

Before jumping into my calendar, I first listed out my ultimate goals, and how every projects aligned with that for the right reasons.

I then listed out all the most essential things that are in the quadrant 2 — not urgent, yet highly important that align with my goals. These are the priorities that we all know are extremely important long term, but often gets sacrificed in the short term. (eg. meditation, working out, writing..etc)

How do I schedule and group them in a way that incentivized myself to be consistent and efficient? Where do I structure them so they can compound on top of each other?

How do I make life happen for me, not to me?

My Themed System

Everyday has a built-in theme:

Sunday: Rest and Reflect

Agenda:

1. Last meal at 6 PM to start the weekly 36 hour fast
2. [Spirit] One hour meditation (7–8 PM)
3. [Mind] One hour reflective writing on the week before & ahead (8–9 PM)
4. [Body] Reward: Sports massage (9–10 PM)

Why:

Taking care of my body, mind, and spirit — in reverse order. Starting with the challenging practice of determined meditation I learned from Vipassana. Followed by reflective writing of the last week, present body/mind/emotion/spirit check-ins, and intentions/top goals/excitement for the week ahead. Ending with the reward of physical relaxation that repairs my body from the week of workouts and strain. I call this my sacred stack — do the harder thing first, and reward yourself in the end.

Monday: Clarity and Alignment

Agenda:

1. Only coffee and water allowed. I fast from Sunday night to Tuesday breakfast weekly for 36 hours.
2. Focus on high-priority team alignment for each project and business

Why:

Fasting could be hard in the beginning, but once your body gets used to it, a switch turns on and you start feeling an incredible sense of mental clarity, high energy and agency.

The reflective writing the night before empowers me to have clear understanding of where things stand for each project and what the highest priorities to address are. Supercharged with the mental clarity and time saved from fasting, it’s the perfect day for alignment meetings with my teams.

I usually start this day with basketball shooting practice as well, doing my favorite workout first day of the week to set the tone.

Tuesday: Discipline and Execute

Agenda:

1. Morning short hike to see the sunrise
2. After the hike, feast on my favorite breakfast in Taiwan to break the fast as a reward.
3. Disciplined execution on what was aligned on Monday and make significant progress on key deliverables.

Why:

Fasting resets my digestive systems and clears any mental fog I might have to allow me to sleep better and wake up with more energy. The slight hunger and desire for my favorite breakfast shop motivates me to get up before 6 and see the sunrise.

I sometimes love bringing a friend along and record a nice reflection deep conversation if we have the time. I then spend the entire day executing on the highest priorities often into the evening.

Wednesday: Social Breadth

Agenda:

1. Heavy lifting at the gym
2. Work at my own cafe the entire day, excited to be interrupted.

Why:

If someone needs me or want to catch up, I tell them to meet me at my cafe, I’ll be here all day. This saves me from the back and forth scheduling dance usually required.

When I first opened my co-working cafe, I would try to get work done here but often will get interrupted by friendly people wanting to say hi and chat, which I loved but would get frustrated at my work progress end of the day. I realized rather than getting stuck in this trying to get work done but often failing middle, I set 0 expectations of getting anything done on a Wednesday and look forward to be interrupted.

This is the day I open my schedule, socialize, and expand my breadth. This also serves as a nice change of pace from the intense and often solo Monday and Tuesday clarity alignment and disciplined executions.

Thursday: Deep Connections

Agenda:

1. Morning: basketball games with the Early Birds Baller Club
2. Afternoon: record a podcast episode (usually takes 3–5 hours)
3. Night: quality time with close friends or date (if any, usually none)

Why:

Thursday is for depth in relationships and conversations rather than breadth. I’m lucky to have a podcasting platform that helps me really get to know someone at an in-depth level not possible in any other setting. I need this to satisfy my intellectual curiosity and and desire for deep connections.

Friday: Finish Strong

Agenda:

1. Leg day at the gym
2. Check in with teams on progress and support needed
3. Do more work to finish the week strong, tie up any loose ends.
4. Evening: unstructured time

Friday is about ending the work week with feeling of accomplishment and joy. When I had more time I would go swing dancing at night (really miss this!)

Saturday: Creative Expression

1. Another heavy lift at the gym
2. Nourish my creative side through various activities such as painting, writing, dancing, reading.. etc.

This day is dedicated to creativity and inspiration, with no pressure to produce specific outcomes.

Overall

Key benefits of this system is:

1. Excitement: Every day’s theme is so different and makes me excited to look forward to every single day when I get to wake up.
2. Baseline: You might not need this when things are going great. It’s when things are going side ways, you’re feeling down, or just going through whatever it is. If I just follow the themes, I know I will end up okay if my body, mind, and spirit are being taken care of by the system.
3. Decision Simplicity: Every task or request that comes in, there is a default slot for it, others also know how to better interact with me (another benefit of publicizing this)
4. Balanced life with recovery: By dedicating specific days to different aspects of life (rest, work, creativity, relationships), I ensure nothing is consistently neglected. Rest and reflection are scheduled components, not afterthoughts.
5. Reduced context switching: Each day has a coherent focus, allowing for deeper engagement.
6. Flexible structure: While providing a framework, this system still allows for spontaneity within each day’s theme. And I always have the autonomy to change things up if I need to (e.g. parents visiting)
7. Stacking Incentives: The evening meditation → writing → massage sequence ensures I complete the challenging spiritual & mental work before receiving the physical reward. The 36-hour fast makes the post-hike breakfast more rewarding, which incentivizes both the hike and the fasting practice. By linking more challenging habits with immediately rewarding ones, I’ve created sustainable behavior chains that support my goals.
8. Health: The fasting also helps with resetting my entire digestive system, and the mental clarity erases any sense of fogginess I might have. I haven’t eaten anything on a Monday in 2025, feels amazing every Monday.
9. No FOMO: Knowing this is my most optimized allocation of time and energy for what I want, the things I don’t get to do, I let it go more easily.

Implementing Your Own Themed System

If you’d like to create your own themed week, consider these steps:

1. Identify your key life dimensions: What aspects of your life need regular attention? (Work, creativity, relationships, health, learning, etc.)
2. Assess your natural rhythms: When are you most energetic, creative, or social? Align themes with your natural tendencies.
3. Design simple habit stacks: Create sequences where easier or more enjoyable activities follow challenging ones.
4. Start small: Could begin with one themed day per week and expand as the system proves valuable.
5. Review and adjust: Use your reflection time to evaluate what’s working and refine your approach.

Remember that the point isn’t rigid adherence to a schedule but having an intentional framework that makes decision-making easier and ensures a balanced life.

Be kind to yourself — one setback doesn’t mean failure. The themed system helps create multiple touch points throughout the week to realign and continue progress toward your most important goals.

How do you structure your week? Have you tried themed days before? I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences in the comments below.