Focus Has a Floor Plan.

Happy Mon-yay, beautiful people.It’s your boy Josiah, back in your inbox.How was your weekend? Good? 

Lovely. I hope you rested.

Yes, It’s a new week, and we’re on day 10, still making strides, fighting everything in me, to do the “boring” stuff because it works…it all compounds.

If you’re new here, welcome to The Stack, a 75-day column exploring creativity, ideas, and the messy art of getting started again.

Today I want to talk productivity. If you’re like me—an over-eager ideator wearing too many hats, then you will find that rhythm is everything. And rhythm—i’ve found, begins with intentional thinking.

A few years ago I moved up north to Manchester, home of the Red Devils (yuck), to chase the dream and actually settle in a city. Manchester’s kinetic energy felt right for building, connecting, and taking honest risks. Work was flowing. I was doing the best agency gigs working with the big leagues like, TK Maxx, Specsavers, adidas, hosting a podcast, consulting for my church through the biggest communications shift in decades. It was epic.

For the first time in my freelance journey, I was busy enough to need a studio—not just a desk. So in search, I found a (very overpriced) two-bed apartment with a view, solid floors, and blessed privacy. The cost made me queasy, but when I stepped in I knew: this room is going to pay me back in clarity.

And it did.

In moving in, I made sure to dive into my designer bag, making sure I curated a space that held the tiny things that made me smile. I got a standing desk rigged up with a curved monitor, a Mac Mini M1 and a bunch of overpowered geeky bits and bobs. The inner child on me was on a high. I loved it!

I put together a shelf to display my endless collections of cameras, I invested in a baby grand piano for my mid-day musings. I even set up multiple shooting zones across the house with multiple tripods with the same quick-release plates, so when I was caught up in test mode, I could run the videos from my head into the SD cards. I had the lights rigged up constantly, and everything in my house answered to my voice. Every switch, every light. It felt ridiculous but it was my flow. I had successfully found a way to slaughter the friction of repetitive boring tasks that drained me.

I had, through curiosity found my pace, and thus built a scary pipeline that scales ideation → creation → the world in minutes. The faster I moved, the more I learned, the better work I produced.

Very quickly I learned that great work lives at the intersection of Curiosity and urgency. And in a world that often overrates willpower and underrates spaces, I had quickly learnt the impact of your environment to your output: Output will always rise, when you enjoy the work.

So If you’re looking to do more with less time (or attention), here’s my stack of principles that kept me shipping and delivering incredible work to high ticket clients.

1. Setup Under 2 minutes (if you can): If it takes too long, you’ll negotiate with yourself.

2. Think Zones, not moods: Go somewhere else for thinking, finds another space for making, and another for shipping. and don’t let tasks fight for the same space— You’re in charge.

3. Duplicate the essentials: Extra SD Cards, batteries, chargers, pens. Spares kill excuses.

4. Guard deep blocks: Section of 60-90 minutes sessions at key points of the day, throw your phone away, and let google let you know when the times up.

5. Ship small, iterate fast: Speed to signal > Perfection. The quicker you do, the quicker you actually know, the better you do next.

6. Protect Joy: Actually get up, and move around. Watch a film whilst doing the silly tasks, play your favourite tune and take a dance break. Call a friend who tells you the truth. Joy is throughput, not décor.

Micro-Geographies (when you can’t move cities)

If you can’t move cities like me, or build the perfect space right now, then maybe try a micro-geography change. Pick a café (ideation), a library (execution), and a walking loop (clarity). Guard a daily window where your phone lives in another room, and ship that way.

That’s design, too.

If you’re journeying with us for the next 75 days, then maybe for the next 30 you run your own experiment.

1. Pick your build district (room or route)

2. Set two outputs (e.g 2 posts per week + 2 deep work hours a day)

3. Review weekly. if joy and shipping rise, keep the system. If not, move a lmap, change the view, and try again.

Don’t be ashamed to study your own frictions and engineer it away where possible.

So if you’ve been contemplating doing better, then this is your sign to make some space for you. Your work will thank you later.

It’s been good folks, same time tomorrow? (maybe earlier hmm)

✳️ The Stack.

Part of the 75-Day Stack Challenge, essays for builders, makers, and doers, finding their start again.

Written by Josiah Hyacinth, creator, strategist, and storyteller exploring the intersection of faith, creativity, and action. Follow along as we unpack what it means to build, become, and begin again.

If today’s note helped, reply with your biggest takeaway, or forward this to one friend who’s building.

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