|
Managing Distractions
If losing your focus doesn't matter, then just go with the flow, and let any distraction become the object of attention, to be replaced by another and another, as one thought triggers another and a new sound triggers other thoughts, and on and on.
If staying focused is important to you, then manage distractions.
Managing distractions is the key to being focused.
It is a life skill that increases your ability to perform optimally, have healthy relationships, enjoy a meal or performance, and be well and happy.
Commit to cultivating intentional focus. That means committing to making conscious choices when you are faced with a distraction.
Here's an example:
During your day there are activities - tasks, conversations, meditations, whatever.
Let's say that you choose to work on cleaning up a mess. You have started the work, intending to dedicate at least an hour to it.
The phone pings, a text has been received. If you heard the ping, it is a distraction. It has momentarily taken your attention from the work. At that moment, you can just bring your attention back to your cleaning.
Or you can choose to check to see who texted you and what it was about. If you do that, you become more distracted from your task. Even if you don't look at your phone, and you think about who it might be from, your focus on the cleaning is no longer “laser-like”.
If you decide to answer the text and get involved in a conversation, you are even more distracted from your task. You are now focused on the conversation, as long as it keeps you more interested in it than in some new distraction, including the guilt about not doing the cleaning.
When your conversation ends, you can go back to cleaning or let a new distraction become your next point of attention.
If you are committed to an activity and motivated to focus on it, you will be more likely to stay with it if you can.
Can You Stay Focused?
To stay focused, you need mindfulness to make you aware that you are distracted, the concentration power to bring your attention to where you want it to be, and the resolve to do it.
That resolve is motivated by the knowledge that when you are focused you can perform more effectively, more thoroughly enjoy pleasure, and be better able to work through challenges.
To stay focused requires mindfulness and concentration. You can improve both by using meditation techniques. At first, it requires lots of patient effort. After a while, mindfulness and concentration become useful habits, until mindful awareness becomes natural and effortless.
More on that in a future article. Or if you can't wait, go get my book "The Peaceful Warrior's Path: Optimal Wellness through Self-Aware Living" https://a.co/d/97LpYib. Chapter 23 Training the Mind: Meditation explores attention, focus, mindfulness, and concentration. Chapter 24 Exercise: Meditation Practice offers techniques.
| 
