Distractions - Procrastination & Staying focused

Good friend Dr.Vikas from Canada has asked me to write on 'staying focused'. 

Let us first ask ourselves, why is it so hard to stay focused?

A restless mind does not let you concentrate. It keeps distracting you. As a result, you get frustrated and become more restless. Many times this leads to procrastination. 

We will cover all these points in this post.

Years of allowing our minds to wander freely and not disciplining it, results in restlessness. But, there is hope. We have to take charge of our thoughts and control our minds. (What I find a little amusing is that it is our mind itself that will try and control itself)

There are three steps. First, accepting and understanding how our restless mind works. Second, understanding the causes of restlessness and distractions. And the third is a no brainer-removing the causes. 

All this is fairly simple but may not be easy. We should be calm and patient, till we achieve it. With practice and perseverance, we too can achieve what others have in past.

Staying focused means having good concentration.

Sri Paramhansa Yogananda said, "Concentration consists in freeing the attention from distractions and focusing it on any thought in which one may be interested".

He adds, "Determine that you will discipline the restless mind - to patiently put aside the thoughts that pull the attention away". 

Let us examine the common causes of distractions, which reinforce our restlessness :

1. Internet..our constant urge to check our e-mails, our want (not need) for social media and for entertainment etc is a major cause of distraction and procrastination. 

2. Television..Something similar to above. After a hard days work, we consider it our right to watch TV. It appears to relax us. On the contrary it feeds us with noise and results in poor sleep, especially if it was the last thing we did before sleeping.

3. Electronic gadgets..It is so disheartening to see everyone bent over their smart phones / gadgets. 

4. Gossip..Idle talking is not only a time killer but also a distraction. When this becomes a habit, we are pulled away from the task at hand by our urge to gossip. Communicating on phone and internet is a necessity, but we must now where to draw the line. Or else we would waste crucial time. Poor time management results in nervousness, which will further cause lack of focus.

5. Visitors..Connected to the above point. We need to be sensible here too.

6. Sense pleasure, indulgence in alcohol and food can also be detrimental to staying focused.

These things affects us indirectly too by forming impressions on our sub-conscious mind. These thought stay dormant till a similar thought acts as stimulus and triggers a thought chain-resulting in further distraction. Many times, when I observe my wandering mind and try and trace the sequence of thought, I reach the source of the trigger. So, we have to feed our mind with right diet and while we are on this path of improving our concentration, we must also apply a high level of awareness. This is not a 'chicken and egg' story but it involves getting into a positive loop or we may end up in a downward spiral. Remember, anything that you do not have but want to get can be achieved with practice.

All the above, waste our time and make us restless. Thus preventing us from doing things which can help us stay calm and therefore more focused.

Now, let us see how procrastination and distraction are connected and how we can eliminate them to stay focused. Procrastination is because of a combination of our fear of failure, a perfectionist attitude and a weak will power, as mentioned in my earlier post. Quite simply, when we are restless and distracted, we must not procrastinate the task at hand but use our will power to stay on it. Exercising of will strengthens it. 

The following example shows that procrastination is quite common.

In 2009, Fred Stutzman, a graduate student, was finding it hard to stay off internet. This made it hard for him to complete important work for his thesis.The urge to connect was far too strong to resist. Frustrated, he created, Freedom, an 'app' that prevents your computer from going online for the preset time. More than half a million people have downloaded it so far. It seems that many people are struggling with online procrastination. 

I did something similar many years back. Television was something, I found hard to resist. I knew it was taking away my precious time and therefore one day, I unhooked the connection. The next few days went fine but bad habits eventually catch up. The urge got so strong on this night that I climbed our house's roof at night to reconnect the cable. That night, I watched TV till 3 am - for 6 straight hours.

But denial and putting constraint on our behavior may not be the best approach. Reducing our choices will certainly help, but that is an indirect way. The direct way is to be aware, to use our discrimination (free will) and will power to make the right choices and do the right actions. These right actions will strengthen our good habits and slowly, it will be easier to make the right choices. Our mind will slowly be more calm and staying focused will be easier.

As I wrote earlier, start small because small changes are sustainable and do 1% shifts(improvements) in your tasks.

To sum up...identify and remove the distractions, feed your mind with right diet, stay calm, make the right choices, do not procrastinate (by facing the fears), strengthen the will power (by exercising it) and slowly you will improve.