Top-down work days vs bottom-up work days

I’ve noticed that, broadly speaking, I have two different types of work days:

1. Top-down days. I begin with long, focused periods of deep work. I might not even touch my admin tasks. Most of my high-quality, focused work (e.g. writing reports, building tools, analysing data) is done on these days.
2. Bottom-up days. I begin with all the admin and fiddly tasks on my to-do list. Then, once my to-do list and mind are both clear, I’ll do a smaller amount of deep work. Most of my planning, idea generation, and other important admin-related tasks is done on these days.

I think it’s important to have both types of day in any one week. The beauty of bottom-up days is that there is less pressure on me to paint the Mona Lisa, and I can still make meaningful and worthy progress towards my goals even if I had e.g. a rubbish sleep. From my own experience, I think a 4-1 split or a 3-2 split in favour of top-down days works the best for me.

The difference in mindset between these two days is well summarised by the art of the Magic card Harmonize vs the art of the Magic card Possibility Storm: