Let’s not lose focus, and jump straight into this shall we…
Tolerating distraction.
Many of us kid ourselves into allowing distractions into our environments because we have an emotional connection to those things.
Email notifications, music, visiting toddlers, Youtube videos, text messages, talking colleagues.
They are all excuses, diluting your needed attention, no matter how much you rationalise allowing them in.
Caffeine.
I love caffeine, it boosts my mood, but this high comes with a cost.
We may have more “energy,” but our focus takes a hit.
Why? Because caffeine puts us in a heightened state, making it harder to bring our attention to any one thing.
We become twitchy and more easily distracted, thinking we’re more focused when we’re not.
A calm, unstimulated mind is ideal for focus.
Multi-tasking.
This one makes me chuckle because doing several things at once is the opposite of focus.
Strong focus means you are doing one thing at a time, undistracted, totally present, and ideally in a flow state.