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These are the 5 common mistakes which people make.

1. Not having a plan #

In the book "Indistractible" by Nir Eyal he says that the opposite of distration is traction. Traction is doing something intentionally towards where you want to go. Distraction is doing something which takes you away from where you want to go. In order to know what you want to do / avoid, you have to have a plan.

social media platforms give us possibility to outsource the desicion of where to spend our time to someone else, and they have teams of people working on how to keep you there as long as possible.

When we have a goal, we are much more likely to gather resources to get there.

2. Ignoring how you feel #

"I am just a distracted person", "This is social media comps fault", etc are all because there is some negative emotion.

1. Boredom
2. Anxiety
3. Self-doubt

Usually, the last two have some underlying fear: ex, "I am not good enough", "can I do it?".

One of the ideas I can use is "Fast, Bad, Wrong" - I can definitely make it fast, bad and wrong. This usually takes away the "I'm not good enough feeling".

For the boring tasks, think about what it would look like if it were fun?. How do you make your work enjoyable and energizing? (Play, Power, People). If the thing is enjoyable, you are much less likely to get distracted.

3. Doing things in parallel #

Attention residue - when you switch from task A to task B, your attention doesn't follow immediately (residue of your focus stays in task A).

If the previous task is completed, and even better, completed under a high time pressure, the attention switch is faster, and the performance in the next task is higher.

It is easier to focus on one thing at a time. Use shared focus mode on the phone. Keep the phone screen down on the table. Dedicate a time block for when to check the messages. Don't even look at messages, to avoid getting distracted. Dedicate the time, say during lunch, when you are going to do that instead. Use calendar for that.

4. Not taking breaks #

The Draugiem Group's research showed that the most productive employees in US worked less hours and took more breaks than the least productive employees. The top group would work 52 min on average, and then would take 17 min off, and then repeat. During the 52 min they were doing one single thing. During the 17 minutes they were completely separated from work, no messages etc.

Approaches:

1. Dedicate exact block of time for both the work and the break
2. Work until the focus drops

Remember: the thing you should do during your break should not generate any additional obligations. Checking messages will generate a bunch of tasks which you have to do, which will distract you from the next task.

5. Not hitting the Golden Trio (Diet, Exercise and Sleep) #

1. Sleep 8 hours
2. Eat healthy food, eat like an adult, don't eat like a child
3. Do exercise every day - can be helpful to do it every morning, in my case when I walk the dog

When you don't get enough sleep - be even more careful, because there is an even higher chance to get distracted.

There is no such thing as a loser who wakes up at 5 AM and does a workout" Sahil Bloom

Wake up 1 hour before, do the exercise, and it will contribute to all the other areas of your life, and will help you avoid distraction. Every single C-lead does a workout in the morning, and every single person struggling with distraction doesn't fulfill the Golden Trio.