BEATING BURNOUT, INCREASING ATTENTION SPANS & WEEKEND DISTRACTIONS!

Welcome to Potentially Focused! Hope your Thursday morning is off to a good start and you’re getting the most out of your summer! Today, we … Take on burnout and share some ways to increase our attention span.

And of course, we've got some much-needed fun stuff for the weekend!

Potentially Focused is a newsletter for busy people in the TV business (or not) who are curious. Anyone interested in growth, great new possibilities, and the stories we tell ourselves and others that get us there or hold us back. Each edition features quick links to at least one great piece of content on professional development and one centered on personal growth. It’s practical information just a few quick paragraphs away.

Please like, subscribe, and share with your most or least attentive friend. All are welcome!

Thank you very much for reading,

Marco

Let's get to it...

HOW TO SPOT BURNOUT AND REVERSE IT

We all have so much pulling at us from work to personal responsibilities. It’s a lot to take on and it can take a toll. It can lead to burnout. But with stress a part of daily life, how do you know if you are dealing with a bad day or two versus being in the grips of a true burnout?

Before we go any further, my usual caveat. I have no training or credentials to treat burnout or any other mental health issues. There is good information in this article , and I’ll share some key points from it in a moment, but if you’re struggling, please see a mental health professional.

According to Molly Burrets, a licensed clinical psychologist, burnout is “a chronic condition that happens when we experience chronic fatigue [and] are overwhelmed when the demands of our life exceed our capacity to meet those demands.” She adds that being burned out can increase your likelihood of experiencing mental health conditions like depression and anxiety.

Like with so many other issues, our body tells us when we are experiencing burnout.

Burrets says the symptoms of burnout come in three categories: physical, emotional, and behavioral.

1. Physical symptoms

“Some of the most common physical symptoms are things like chronic fatigue or insomnia, difficulty either falling or staying asleep,” Burrets says.

Additional physical symptoms that can indicate you’re burnt out may include:

·?? Frequent headaches

·?? Muscle pain

·?? Digestive issues

·?? Weakened immune system

2. Emotional symptoms

The emotional indicators of burnout tend to be the signs that are most commonly associated with the phenomenon. “These are ones that people are often most primed to notice and understand indicate a real problem,” according to Burrets.

Those symptoms include:

·?? Increased irritability

·?? Experiencing a loss of motivation, even to do things that bring you joy

·?? Feeling detached or emotionally drained

·?? Increased frustration

·?? Having negative feelings about work or caregiving responsibilities

3. Behavioral symptoms

Look out for shifts in your behavior that are likely being used as coping mechanisms, Burrets says. Some of the most common behavioral symptoms include overeating, binge drinking or increased drug use.

But behavioral symptoms can also manifest as:

·?? Procrastination

·?? Withdrawal from social responsibilities

·?? Isolation from others

·?? Lower levels of productivity, especially at work

“If you notice that you are having behavioral symptoms, emotional symptoms and physical health symptoms, that’s a red flag, you are burnt out by that point.”

The good news is burnout can be reversed.

The first step is to visit a doctor to make sure your symptoms aren’t due to other underlying health conditions.

Then, it’s a good idea to prioritize self-care and that often means reducing your workload.

In terms of self-care, Burrets recommends trying out some of the following:

·?? Exercise and physical activity

·?? Quality time with friends and family

·?? A new hobby

·?? Meditation

·?? Mindfulness activities

Before you add anything else to your plate, she says it’s important to “look at the demands on your time and ask yourself, what can be removed” — with a minimal impact on your life.

The goal is to “take some things off our plate that are inessential and perhaps add in some self-care activities in place of those, or just more downtime, more rest and relaxation.”

Making these tough choices, Burrets says, is ultimately essential for recovery. “We have to have boundaries to prevent burnout.”

Very solid advice indeed.

Now on to finding ways to be better at the essential….

HOW TO INCREASE YOUR ATTENTION SPAN

Scientists disagree on exactly how to measure attention spans, but most think they’re getting shorter. From my own experience and conversations with friends, I’d say most non-scientists would agree. And look no further than the business a lot of us are in for more evidence, TV shows are paced up with shorter shot durations than years ago.

All of this comes from the vast amount of information available to us and coming at us on a moment-by-moment basis. For many of us, it’s become a self-enforcing habit. We are so used to being constantly interrupted that we’ve begun to interrupt ourselves.

As an example, between paragraphs, I just felt compelled to check my email.

To accommodate our need for ongoing interruption many of us turn to multi-tasking. The problem is true multitasking doesn’t exist. You just can’t do two things at once as efficiently as you can do one thing at a time. When you are multi-tasking what you’re really doing is constantly switching between two or more tasks but in a way that results in you doing all of the tasks slower and less well.

So, it turns out that paying attention and the ability to focus on one thing at a time, is still critical. The good news is that there are ways to increase your attention span.

Before we get there, as with burnout, it’s important to say I have no qualifications to comment on ADD or any conditions related to it. Some of the below may not apply to everyone. Please get proper medical care if you suspect you are in need.

With that caveat, in this linked article , you can find out much more, but here are some things that may be able to help you get better at paying attention:

Listen to binaural beats

Binaural beats create a fascinating auditory illusion. When one tone is played into your left ear and another one – with a slightly different frequency – is played into your right, your?brain ?synthesizes a third tone, the difference between the two.

This effectively means that listening to lower-frequency binaural beats can nudge your brain waves into lower frequencies, which promotes relaxation (when you’re asleep, your brain waves are low frequency). In the same way, listening to higher-frequency beats may lead to improvements in concentration. ?

Sync your body clock

Lining up your most mentally taxing tasks with your natural peaks of focus is key to concentration. Research has found that, on average, these high points occur around 10am in the morning and around 2-3pm in the afternoon.?

There are, however, variations around these times, depending on whether you’re more of a morning lark or a night owl.

Take a yoga nidra break

The best way to refuel your focus could be practicing yoga nidra, which when translated, literally means ‘yoga sleep’. It’s a way of entering a deeply relaxed state of consciousness with brain activity similar to sleep, even though you remain awake.

Also referred to as ‘non-sleep deep rest’ (NSDR), it may boost attention by helping remove waste from the brain.

Cool your lighting

You might want to paint your walls a shade of blue or green or invest in a tinted light bulb for your desk. That’s because just as we work best at certain temperatures (usually 16–24°C/60–75°F),?visual?warmth can have an impact too.

And for the record, white walls are terrible for concentration…

Try martial arts??

Research found that?people who practiced martial arts achieved long-lasting improvements in their focus .?

Picture your future self

Imagining your future self at the end of the day – where you are, what you’re doing, who you’re with – can seriously help stop you getting side-tracked, according to research.

Think about how at 7pm you want to feel rewarded and fulfilled and visualize yourself being with family and friends or reading and relaxing.

Having a strong visualization like that can help curtail that urge to check social media or email because you have this goal of where you want to be at the end of the day.

Similar future-self visualizations (including staring at photos of your own digitally aged faces) have been shown to increase the desire to save for retirement and to eat more healthily too.

And now here’s some more for your near future self…

HAPPY WEEKENDING!

As we do every Thursday, sharing some fun stuff for your weekend. Enjoy!

All over the world, legends and folklore tell stories of creatures that tell us something about our deepest fears. Here’s an article about 11 astonishing mythical creatures .

The horse is an astonishing creature in its own right and according to this article , we’re finding out they're much smarter than we previously thought.

THAT WILL DO IT!

We’re all done for this week. In this edition, we shared tips on how to reverse burnout and paid some attention to paying better attention.

Plus, we confirmed what we’ve long suspected. Horses are far more intelligent than we often give them credit for. Go horses!

See you on Tuesday when we'll have a special Best of Potentially Focused Interviews edition all ready for your long holiday weekend!

Until then, wishing you all a fun time with family and friends this weekend!

Thanks to you all for reading. Please let us know what you want more or less of. Please feel free to share information you’d like me to pass along to our readers. Also, always happy to feature guest contributors.

And of course, please like, subscribe, and share.

With much appreciation,

Marco

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