How to Become Indistractable
What is a Distraction?
As per the definition, distractions involve diverting someone’s attention away from what they’re trying to do.
Distractions come in two forms:
- Internal distractions. These are distractions generated by your own mind. Among these are fatigue, illness, personal problems, and daydreaming.
- External distractions. These are the distractions you encounter outside of your mind. They include things like phone calls, emails, texts, and social media notifications. Chatty co-workers or anything visually distracting can also be examples.
The Steps to Becoming Indistracable
1. Master internal triggers.
The best way to handle intrusive thoughts is not to fight them. Instead, it’s finding new methods to deal with them.
In order to do so, Eyal says that we need to take the following four steps:
- 1. Focus on identifying the internal trigger that causes the discomfort before the distraction takes place.
- 2. Keep a record of the trigger.
- 3. Rather than being dismissive of your negative feelings, explore them with curiosity.
- 4. While transitioning from one activity to another, exercise extra caution.
“Reimagining the internal trigger, the task, and our temperament are powerful and proven ways to deal with distractions that start within us,” continues Eyal. Our discomfort can be dealt with by reflecting rather than reacting to it. By finding fun in the task we are trying to accomplish, we can reimagine it.
2. Make time for traction.
Without planning time to do what matters, our life falls out of balance quickly.
As long as that’s what you intend to do, scrolling on social media, playing a video game, or watching Netflix is fine. After all, we can benefit from taking a break from time to time. But we get in trouble when we unintentionally do these things. To make this practice work, you need to schedule every minute of every day. This technique is called “timeboxing” or making a “zero-based calendar.”
3. Combat external triggers.
External triggers are often used by tech companies to capture our attention. It should, however, come as no surprise that smartphones are responsible for a lot of these triggers.
Here are a few things to keep in mind:
- If you no longer need an app, remove it.
- For apps that you enjoy, uninstall them on your phone and access them from your computer.
- Rearrange your apps on your phone’s home screen to reduce clutter.
- If you aren’t interested in getting updates from one or more apps, such as social media, remove the notification settings for those apps.
4. Prevent distractions by making a pact.
The last step to becoming indistractable involves preventing ourselves from sliding into distraction. But only once have we learned to master internal triggers, make space for traction, and reduce external triggers.
“To do so, we must learn a powerful technique called ‘precommitment,’ which involves removing a choice in the future to overcome our impulses in the present,” Eyal explains. With effort pacts, you can reduce distractions and make unwanted behaviors more difficult. Making a price pact can also encourage you to keep your promises by putting money on the line.
Read the complete article available at Thrive Global!
Reflection:
Are you easily distracted?
#Distractions #Attention #Goals
Thank you for sharing this great article with us here. It was a great read and to learn about the subject.
@Asher You're very welcome! I'm glad you found it helpful.