Ignoring Others - The Power of Being Focused
Every day, countless distractions draw your attention away from the tasks you are focusing on. It’s time to get serious about staying focused.
The Distractions You Can Control
Whenever you set out to accomplish anything, distractions conspire to draw your attention away. Your biggest enemy here is usually your own brain, in the form of stray thoughts or suddenly remembered “crucial” outside tasks. Unless you are thoroughly every aspect of what you are currently doing, chances are your own mind will try to tell you that something else absolutely needs to be addressed.
One of the easiest places to spot this is if you work in an office environment, or similar place where you have people around you and everyone has access to phones, E-mail, and each other. Suddenly it becomes very important that you check your E-mail again, get into a conversation with a colleague, or anything else other than what you are doing.
Don’t blame your brain for this, it’s just trying to protect you from the mental strain of fighting the boredom of the dreaded task. A for more constructive practice is to give it as little ammunition as possible. Turn off all of your notifications that are not directly related to your current task or project. This applies whether you are working on something for your job, or a project at home. Social media, friends, and family will still be there in a few hours. Close your unnecessary web browsers and apps, turn off the TV, put your phone on silent. You get the idea. Resolve before you start to work through a shorter period of time without these things to see the end result sooner, rather than doubling or even tripling the time it takes and lowering the quality by indulging frequent distractions. If the task can’t be fully completed in this session, set an aggressive benchmark and apply the same rules.
People: The Distraction You Can’t Control
Unfortunately, you have no direct control over the biggest potential distraction: other people. Even the most well-meaning people can fail to understand your need to ignore distractions and focus. So you need to help them understand. Failing them understanding, you need to know how to firmly but politely put your foot down anyway.
People in Person
This one is fairly easy, though usually the most uncomfortable for people. In most professional environments, people will just walk up to you to talk about whatever is on their mind. It’s not malicious. They simply either have nothing to do and want an outlet for their boredom, or are seeking to avoid their own tasks. Either way, the best way to avoid this is to simply not engage at all. Wear headphones and listen to music or podcasts at all times when not on calls or actively engaged in vital conversations directly pertaining to your work.
While this will deter many people, it will not work on everyone. Some people will speak loudly until they get your attention, or even resort to touching you when that doesn’t work. For these people, politely but bluntly explain that you are busy and do not have time to talk. This will be difficult for some of you to do, as it can feel “mean.” Some people will take this a personal rejection, or as an indication that you “don’t care.” Which, to a certain degree, is correct. Compared to he importance of completing your task, you do not care about this person’s personal life or work load. Chances are you do care, just not more than you do about your performance and the task at hand. If people push the issue of demanding your attention, have this conversation with them. If their issue is truly crucially important, make it clear that you expect that to be stated clearly and immediately.
This can be either much easier or much harder when in personal spaces where room mates, children, spouses, and so forth are present. There tends to be an expectation from these people that you will pay attention to them whenever they want you to. While not unreasonable in and of itself, this expectation needs to be managed. If they don’t know that you need certain periods of time where you can be left to focus, then they are not at fault if they interrupt you. Have one slightly uncomfortable conversation now, instead of having a fight later when people feel neglected.
People Remotely
This one is even easier mechanically, but also runs the risk of offending people much more easily. In the age of “ghosting,” some people can be very sensitive to being ignored, especially if they are new to your life.
There is a balance to strike here, both professional and personally. Professionally, this can be as easy as setting an E-mail auto-response and appropriate voice-mail message. People will take the hint. If anyone above you takes offense or asks why, simply explain that you are trying to be more productive and avoid distractions.
In your personal life, this can get more complicated. Long time friends, lovers, and family members can go either way. Some will immediately respect your wishes once you explain, others might take offense. It is up to you to decide what is most important to you. Just realize that most people that have been in your life for a long time will understand if you are respectful and don’t back down. If they don’t, how much do they really care about you?
How Do You Stay Focused?
How do you stay focused and deal with distractions? Share your methods and tricks below.