Increase Traction by Reducing Distraction
As you can see distraction (dis-traction) is actually the opposite of traction. There are ways to banish distraction so you can be more effective.
Triggers Rule Us
I’ve been reading and learning a lot about productivity. The more I learn the more I realize that we mostly act based on triggers in our environment and in our head.
External Triggers
External triggers are anything outside of our head that we sense via our senses of sight, smell, taste, hearing, or touch. For example, I see a bill on the desk that came in the mail, that triggers an action to open it up and pay it immediately… ok, actually I just put it in a pile to deal with later :-). I see and smell a delicious looking cake, that’s a trigger and I usually want to eat that cake. I hear some fun music, I want to dance. You get the idea.
Internal Triggers
Internal triggers are thoughts in our mind that usually result in us choosing an action. For example, I’m bored, let me get my phone out and check my email for anything interesting. I’m feeling anxious about a certain task on my list, let’s browse some internet sites to avoid the anxiety.
Internal & External Triggers Lead to Distraction
In order to accomplish something we need to show up and actually take action—focused action. This is what happens most of the time and then our focus goes somewhere else due to distraction. We may (or may not) get back to the original thing we were doing but a lot of time is lost.
Reducing Distraction
Removing external triggers reduces distraction. Here’s how you can avoid triggers and distraction:
- Visual triggers: work in a space that only has the things you need to get the task done.
- Auditory Triggers: Work somewhere quiet or wear sound cancelling headphones.
- Social or Tech Triggers: Turn off notifications & close your apps.
Reducing distractions from internal triggers is harder. You can make progress in this struggle by scheduling time for the things that popup in our head. For instance, say you are wondering about your friends and want to see if they’ve shared anything new on Facebook. Instead of switching over, intentionally schedule time to be on Facebook during your day. When you schedule time to do something you are actually experiencing traction instead of distraction (even for browsing Facebook or watching a video) because you intentionally made time to do it and you did not get off course from your original task. The same is true for checking email, or any other activity that is unrelated to what you are focusing on and trying to get traction. The idea is to be explicit about scheduling time to do things and avoid getting derailed by triggers.
Apps like Yomez can help with being intentional about your time and also staying balanced doing fun things that you enjoy without being distracted.
Make it Harder to be Distracted
Another simple trick to defuse internal triggers is to make it harder for yourself to be distracted. For example, if your phone is in another room, you are much less likely to check it then if it were in your pocket. The same is true for many things like foods you want to avoid. If you have a hard time resisting cookies, you can simply not bring them into your home.
Conquering our Triggers and Being Intentional
Conquering our triggers and being intentional about the things we want to do reduces distraction, increases focus, and enables us to accomplish our goals effectively and efficiently. We can still enjoy the things we find pleasurable like browsing Facebook or watching a video as long as we intentionally and explicitly make time for those things and stay on course.
