Eliminating Distractions

Just a few more days and it will officially be 2024. Time to get around family and friends, enjoy some food, maybe sing a few verses of “Auld Lang Syne”. I sincerely hope that the upcoming year will be a truly great one for you. As for me, I’ve recently learned a valuable lesson that will continue with me for through the following year. Put simply; I’m learning that if I’m truly going to accomplish all that I wish, I need to eliminate all distractions.

Allow me to elaborate for a moment. ‘Distractions’ isn’t the most clearly defined term. Different people are distracted by different things. In my case I tend to define ‘distraction’ in very simple terms; anything that is keeping me from achieving my goals. As I have discovered over the past several weeks there are a lot of things in my life that would certainly fit in this category. All sorts of things from Monday Night Football, to random news headlines.

In fact, just before sitting down to write this very article I made a major time blunder. I sat down to play “Age of Empires II” for what I assumed would be ‘just ten minutes’. An hour later I stared aghast at the clock, realizing I had blown a little over an hour. Without getting a single word out. What was it Shakespeare said? “To err is human?” (And I am definitely only human when it comes to “Age of Empires”)

I’ve been working on my time management hard core since last November. I sat down and decided that I was going to write a novel, and I vowed to sit at my keyboard for ten hours if I had to. I made a decision that nothing would get in my way. So, I had to make some adjustments. I’ve learned the the way I start my day is absolutely vital. For example, I really can’t watch the news in the morning. The news (any news, all the news), will eat up at least forty-five minutes out of my day. Even worse, inevitably I’ll end up wasting all kinds of mental energy on reacting to the latest headline. So when I finally do get around to writing, my mental focus is out of whack and Is pend about an hour and a half trying to get my mind back on track.

So here’s my first rule for eliminating distractions; “Unless there is an active coup and there is a foreign flag flying over the White House, then whatever is going on can wait a couple of hours.” This is especially difficult because we’re in an election cycle and there is all kinds of stuff going on. It’s not time sensitive, I can react and rant when I’m done working. I ignore the morning news.

Which brings me to another essential rule, “I don’t need to see the latest movie trailer or read about ’10 Sea Creatures I Won’t Believe Exist!'” Whatever the movie is, it won’t be coming out for months, so it can definitely wait until later. Oh, and the unbelievable sea creatures? Total bust, the whole list was made up of microscopic crustaceans. Unless you get real footage of the Loch Ness Monster or something, then it’s irrelevant.

Here’s another major distraction, planning. I have literally wasted dozens of hours crafting all these beautifully laid out schedules. Some of them were nearly works of art. Then there’s all these “Power Charts” and stuff they have on the internet for you to fill out. I’ve been suckered time after time filling out the latest ‘power chart’. Not one of these charts have helped me. I’m not saying that schedules and setting goals on paper are useless. What I am saying is that filling out a cool looking chart is no replacement for commitment. (I have more to say not his later, so stay tuned)

I could keep going on. I’ll circle back around to my original point, unless it’s actively aiding my production in some way, then everything classifies as a distraction. Mostly I’ve found that 80% of distractions can be linked to TV and the internet. If I regulate these two distractions, my productions skyrockets. There’s no way to eliminate every single distraction. When my cat comes over for some attention, when that annoying neighbor won’t SHUT UP, and on it goes. I don’t sweat it. Sometimes I think that life is like Bugs Bunny when he tortured that poor opera singer. (If you haven’t seen the cartoon, it’s pretty funny) Just worry about what you can control, that’s all the matters. All I’m worried about is taking advantage of what I know I am capable of and eliminating anything that keeps me from being great.