Execution Strategy – Minimize Distractions

This strategy to aid in achieving your goals is in some ways the complete opposite of the prior post.  While sometimes we need to look for external motivators to help us stay focused, other times we need to strip all of that distraction away.  (This is one of those delicate “balance” items that is truthfully never balanced but rather in various states of imbalance all the time.)

In January as I sat down and created my resolutions/goals for the year, I realized that my organizing efforts needed to extend to decluttering my schedule.  As I pondered how to fit even more activities into an already full schedule, the only area I really had open to cutting was my goofing off time on the Internet.

This was going to be tough for me since I am a firm believer that downtime is necessary for the proper mental health functioning of a person.  We can’t be productive 100% of the time.  Sometimes you just need a well-deserved rest, or time to ponder things or just veg out and enjoy yourself.

Two of my particularly terrible vices are celebrity gossip and Facebook.  I wasn’t spending all that much time on Facebook itself but I found that often my brain would get wrapped around some trivial thing mentioned on Facebook and it would preoccupy me for hours, thinking about its implications.  It was becoming a huge distraction.

I told my husband I was going to restrict my Facebook time as well as my other recreational web browsing.  “Sounds great,” he said.  He then volunteered to aid in that effort by using technology to block various websites on our home network, opening them up for only one hour each day in the evening.  Before I could process how that would impact me, he had the blocking software up and running and the fix was in.

Naturally, there was a withdrawal period where I kept instinctively typing in the name of blocked sites.  I also had to use some self-discipline to not use my iPhone to get around the blocks.  Gradually, I found I was checking Facebook less and less.  Facebook also started to lose some of its appeal.  When Facebook time becomes scarce and you really look forward to checking it, it is an enormous disappointment when you finally log on only to find it is a slow “status” day and there is nothing much of interest.

I am nowhere near the prospect of recapturing all that recreational browsing time and transforming it into productive activities like cleaning and organizing but perhaps in time.  So far, I have begun to substitute other websites for the blocked sites.  My entertainment now comes from news websites.  The quality of writing is better and the content is more complex.  It was like switching from sugar to vegetables.   I still crave the sugar sometimes but it has also been interesting to see that once you are accustomed to more demanding content, celebrity gossip just isn’t as interesting (still interesting, mind you….just not to the same extent as before!).

As another example of my content dieting, I have so far resisted joining Pinterest.  I know that I would absolutely love Pinterest and I would probably get a ton of ideas from it.  Google Analytics tells me some of the projects from this blog have been “pinned” and are generating visitors to my site.  (Thank you, by the way, to anyone who has been doing this!)  But since every conversation I have with a Pinterest user always results in the other person saying, “I spend way too much time on Pinterest.” I knew that I could never join it.  A recent Washington Post column comparing it to “digital crack for women” is probably right on target for me.  I don’t begrudge anyone else who uses the service.  I just know I lack the self-discipline to use it wisely.

Some of Ruly’s Facebook fans may have felt the effects of my content diet. I stopped posting Facebook updates for each blog post since I never seemed to be posting when Facebook was accessible to me.  Curiously, however, this situation ended up solving a problem for me.  I have always wanted to offer an option for people reading my blog to just subscribe to the end-of-month summaries.  It was an easy decision to make Facebook this vehicle.   So, if you only want to receive the end-of-month summaries, becoming a Facebook subscriber is the route to go!  If you want individual posts, join the email list or Twitter feed.

My content dieting methods may not be popular or fun and I have to give them more time before I can definitively say whether they are helping me be more effective or not.  As of now, I can say that there are times my mind feels more “settled.”  I still get easily distracted and I still waste way too much time browsing the web but I do find myself focusing  a little better on mentally challenging tasks.

What distractions are pulling you away from the goals you want to achieve?  What have you given up to gain more time?  Please share in the comments.