Struggle with Constant Distractions? Read this.

"Distraction is the main problem for us all - what the Buddha called the monkey mind. We need to tame this monkey mind."

-?Tenzin Palmo

In Part 2 of this Scheduling Series we will continue to peel back layers of the human experience. And what we notice is that it’s not hard to find fundamental similarities that we all share. At the root level is the never ending challenge of focusing of our attention.

Before you begin to tell yourself, stories or compare yourself to other’s who appear to be more productive, perform at a higher level or who exude balance in their life, know that we all possess what the Buddha called a ‘monkey mind’. And in the Information Age our monkey mind has been given tools that it is not biologically adapted to handle with care.

Answer this question honestly:

Do you control your technological tools, or do they control you?

Stop and think for a moment about these questions.

Do you engage with them intentionally?

Do you decide when and how to use them?

Do you always complete what it is you set out to do when using them?

Can you put your technology down when you are done and resist it?

A New Way to Work

If you’re like most humans in the 21st century, these tools have presented our monkey minds a real challenge, and its no longer a secret they’re designed to do just that: addictively hijack our attention.

A mobile consumer report from Bank of America found the following:

-?????????71% of people who own smartphones sleep with them on a nightstand or in their bed.

-?????????3% sleep with them in their hand

-?????????35% said their first thought in the morning was about their phone

All day long we are receiving vibrations or notifications, increasing our excitement and producing mild anxiety. We are receiving messages, likes, comments that instantly give us positive or negative feedback. We use it to help us find directions to a coffee shop and 10 minutes later find we haven’t put the car in drive because we are stuck on Instagram.

Our technology controls us much more than we think or are willing to admit. And it’s wreaking havoc on our minds, bodies, relationships, and social fabric. As Jamie Wheal says in his new book Recapture the Rapture:

“We’re overcooked, overclocked and losing our minds.”

Jamie Wheal, Recapture the Rapture

And it's true, but when we reframe our relationship to our technology, we can begin to see areas where we can be more intentional. The parallel that I often draw for people is that our phones, iPads, laptops and technology are ONLY TOOLS.

Imagine for a moment that your phone is a hammer. And everyone has a hammer. They carry it around with them every second of everyday. Some people have hammers so big they don’t fit in their pockets. And even worse, almost none of them are using the hammer to build homes. They are carrying around a very useful tool, but use it completely ineffectively.

Maybe that's a bit overly simplistic, I know, but when we begin to relate to our technology as a tool we can begin to create a more intentional relationship with it.

The Overuse of Technological Tools Creates Shallow Work

One of the biggest hurdles our technology presents is the overwhelming amount of what Cal Newport describes as “shallow work”. Shallow work is non-cognitively demanding, logistical style tasks, often performed while distracted. These efforts tend not to create much new value in the world and are easy to replicate.

Think of a day spent constantly sending our receiving emails with frequent Facebook, BuzzFeed or Reddit breaks. Your attention is fragmented and your technological tools never leave your side. And when we go home we wonder why we have trouble “turning work off”. Our neural circuits are fried from being on all day.

Newport presents a new way to approach our lives and work while using the most positive aspects of technology. He calls it Deep Work.

"Deep Work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task."

-Cal Newport

How to Work Deeply

If you read the first part in this series, it focused on getting clear on what is essential to us. We can bring that framework to this context and add the idea of creating time in our lives where our attention is deep and focused.

• What are your most important goals in your personal life?
• What are the most important goals in your professional life?

Almost no one is responding to these with the answers, “Spend 16 hours a day on IG” or “Break the world record for screen time”. Well, I hope not at least.

You get to choose how to spend your energy and time. Sit down on Sunday and plan out what you want your week to look like.

Each day use these questions as reminders to bring your attention to what matters most.

• “If you could only do one thing with your life right now, what would you do?”
• “Is this the most important thing for me to be doing at this moment?”

The ability to choose cannot be taken or given away, but it can be forgotten.

Here's 5 ways to develop your ability to work deeply.

1. Strengthen your ability to discern. As we’ve seen almost everything is noise, our technology is designed to hijack our attention and very few things are exceptionally valuable.
2. Learn to tell the difference between the truly important and everything else.
3. If you’re deciding between 5 tasks, a few good questions to ask are…

• “Which one of these if I did it would make all of the others useless?”
• “What do I need right now?”

4. Examine trade-offs carefully: we can’t have it all or do it all

5. Saying yes to any opportunity requires saying no to many others. This is ever present in the amount of time and attention we give to our technology.

• “What is the trade-off I want to make?”
• “What can I go big on and what will it make?
• “What would saying ‘no’ allow me to do instead?”

How to Reduce Distraction

No conversation around deep work is complete without also examining how we will reduce distraction. There's no shortage of resources out there to help you. Here's a few I've found to be extremely useful.

Remember, as helpful as these tools may be in theory it is the practice that helps make them become habits. Start small, but be consistent.

1. Set Limits on social media & email

How many people have had this thought to themselves that they should create limits on their screen time daily, only to have that thought hijacked by the exact technology they are seeking to use less? And the cycle continues.

Here is an incomplete list of small, actionable items you can experiment with immediately. Give 1 or 2 a try. Don’t set out to blaze through the entire list in one week. Focus on consistency and what works best for you. For me, sleeping with my phone in the other room has been one of the most positive changes I’ve made to be more intentional with my technology.

o??Sleep with your phone in a different room

o??Set start and stop times for phone use (preferably a minimum 1 hour after waking and 1 hour before sleep)

o??Do not check email until you have completed 1 hour of demanding work

o??Leave your phone in a different room and on airplane mode when working deeply

o??Turn off all notifications, sounds and badges. You should have to pick your phone up to use it when necessary, not the other way around.

o??Delete social media apps off of your phone

o If necessary, set limits on your apps and stick to them

o??Clear your home screen

o??Work in batches of 90 minutes

o? Reward yourself with a few minutes of breaks, you’ll be amazed at how little you want to engage with this noise after some time

o??Set 2 time periods a day for email (late morning and late afternoon)

o??Use tools like: Airplane Mode, De procrastination, Pomodoro

2.?Strengthen your attention and focus

What if we could use these life-changing tools to help us become more mindful and aware, rather than increasingly frantic? Tall task for sure, but within our abilities. The Guardian posted an article that highlighted research from Dr. Sharon Horwood that found:

“What we do find with technology like smartphones and tablets is that they have the tendency to increase our absent-mindedness, reduce our ability to think and remember, to pay attention to things and regulate emotion. Most of us have our phones within arm’s reach. Even the possibility of a message or a call or something happening on social media is enough to divert our attention away from what we are doing.”

These tools fragment our time and reduce our ability to concentrate. The constant communication is also often not enriching, instead it is impoverishing.

Identifying what matters most in your life and attempting to asses the impacts of various technological tools on these factors doesn’t reduce to a simple formula that solves the problem; this requires practice and experimentation and a bit of willpower.

Take control of your digital domain and life by becoming the master of your technology, not the other way around.

We need people who are paying attention because in order to listen and communicate we must be present and paying attention. That same study from the Guardian also found that not only are our cognitive abilities impaired, but so is our ability to develop empathy.

There is no short-cut to success. Just start. Create a schedule that you want to follow each day, not in theory or on paper, but in practice. Act, get feedback and adjust where necessary.

If you're ready to engage with your technology and life more intentionally join my Foundation Creation 1:1 Program. We work together to create the life that you've always wanted to live. Click here to learn more.

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Alex Barilec is a professional High-Performance Coach, Life Coach and Mentor. He works with CEO's, entrepreneurs, educators, business owners and government employees to upgrade their beliefs, develop a blueprint for a healthier life and re-create their lives with intention. Clients who seek his support have gone from 80 hour work weeks in jobs they don’t enjoy to creating their own opportunities in the field of their choice, starting their own businesses, deepened their connections with friends, family and significant others and have developed the confidence and unwavering belief in their own innate abilities. He was professionally certified as a Life Coach by the Coach Training Alliance and hold a Bachelors Degree in Business Management from John Carroll University.?