"What the fuck is wrong with me?," I thought to myself. I seemed to be clicking on all cylinders -- I felt healthy, strong, motivated, and driven... yet, I wasn't clicking on all cylinders, because nothing was clicking.

And it was really frustrating.

I couldn't figure out why. I tried to run through a mental checklist -- did I have enough food? Water? When's the last time I exercised? Had I slept enough? Was what I wanted to work on poorly defined?

And then, by accident, I created one of the most useful self-diagnostic/self-management tools I ever made. Now, I'm going to share with you, but with one caveat -- try it before dismissing it as too simple. It's a world-beater for me.

And here it is --

"Energy   /Morale   /Health   /Creativity   /Intelligence   /Focus   ---Confusion   /Anxiety   /Restlessness"

There you go. That's my "Moment-by-Moment Ratings." Whenever I'm feeling off, I run through it. Here's earlier tonight:

--> Current rankings: Energy  6 /Morale  6 /Health  8 /Creativity 4  /Intelligence 5  /Focus 2  ---Confusion 2  /Anxiety 2  /Restlessness 9. Avg: 5.2 positive, 3 negative

It's on a 1 to 10 scale. I copy/paste the blank one, and fill it out. The six "Positive" categories relate to how energetic I feel, how motivated I feel and how I rank my morale and outlook in general, how healthy I feel at that moment, how creative I feel (in an innovating / inventing / "breaking new ground" way), and how smart I feel (more related to number-crunching and raw processing ability... I don't drink any more, but when I did -- three glasses of red wine might have taken my creativity up, and intelligence down).

I also have three "Negative" categories -- confusion which is how fogged over my mind feels, anxiety which is nervousness and tension at a task I need to do (cold-calling someone, perhaps), and "restlessness" -- how much I want to do something different from what I'm doing.

I do a simple averaging at the end. Add up and divide the positive category by six, add up and divide the negative category by three. It's not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but lets me broadly compare how I'm doing and where there's a hole.

So, let's get back to earlier tonight. I felt "mostly pretty good," so where were things going wrong?

--> Current rankings: Energy  6 /Morale  6 /Health  8 /Creativity 4  /Intelligence 5  /Focus 2  ---Confusion 2  /Anxiety 2  /Restlessness 9. Avg: 5.2 positive, 3 negative

Well, I was slightly energetic, slightly positive, feeling very healthy... not particularly creative or intelligence, but not in a way that was going to stop me from routine work... I also felt almost no confusion or anxiety. So, the whole problem came down to two things -- I couldn't focus and felt restless.

The next note on my sheet was -- "The restlessness is very high. Going to go for a walk."

And I did.

Two hours later...

"Long walk. Legs sore, but feel much better. Used up some of that physical energy. Back at 7-11 now. 

--> New rankings: Energy 8  /Morale 8  /Health 8  /Creativity 6  /Intelligence 7  /Focus 6  ---Confusion 2  /Anxiety 2  /Restlessness 4. Avg: 7.2 positive, 2.7 negative"

You're note my scores improved across the board, the terminally low focus came up to a respectable 6 out of 10, and the critically high negative restlessness went down to a manageable 2.

And I had one of the best work-nights I've had in ages.

Try this out. 

You'll probably want to customize your categories based on what maps to your performance and hangups. For instance, I don't have "Aggravated" as one of my negative categories -- because I've noticed it doesn't really correlate with how well I work.

But, for you, it might be different. Or, you might want to use "Willpower" or "Alertness" as a category... however it works for you.

Use my categories if you like, use any categories, but do make sure you try this. I've gotten major mileage since I've started running a quick self-diagnostic if I'm stuck, but can't figure out where. If I feel very unhealthy, the answer might be to nap, eat good food, or grab a shower. Restless? A walk or a run. Poor focus? Maybe take a break for a set amount of time, or pick something that doesn't need good focus. Low intelligence and low creativity? Might be a good time to do laundry and grocery shopping.

It's trivially easy, and the impact is huge. Give it a whirl and let us know how it goes in the comments or the Community section.