I’ve long believed that if I could actually focus—both in
the macro sense of focusing on one business at a time, and in the micro sense
of focusing on one task at a time—I’d probably rule the world.
It took me 15 minutes to write that sentence because once I
wrote “focusing on one business”, I was reminded that I had double booked a
meeting in to discuss getting into yet another business, and I stopped and
emailed the people involved in that meeting, and while I was in my emails, a
couple of more came through that I ‘needed’ to answer.
Yep, my Mind Monkey, Maurice, is really having his way with
me today.
But I have found something weird that helps with the
micro-focusing, and that’s listening to a specific type of music. I heard about
this on a productivity podcast a year or 2 ago; the theory
behind why it works is that the music keeps your unconscious mind—i.e. Maurice—occupied
so that your conscious mind can do the work you’ve set out for it undisturbed.
The music has to meet specific requirements: it can’t be
familiar, it can’t have lyrics, it has to be played at a volume that’s just a
bit louder than ambient sound.
I know, it’s tres bizarre. But it does work. With the music playing
in my ear, I can concentrate for an hour or more in a row on the task at hand—impossible
under normal circumstances.
There are lots of “music for focus” entries on YouTube; I
actually subscribe to a service called www.FocusatWill.com
that gives me multiple choices of “type” (there are even 2 channels for people
with ADD, if you’re into all that).
I've known this for quite awhile. I've known about the phenomenon, I've
known that it WORKS for me, and yet, guess how often I use it? The word 'sporadically' comes to mind. The word 'rarely' would probably be more accurate.
Given that focus, or lack thereof, is the mental healthiness issue that I most often point to as the #1 thing that torpedoes me, disappoints me, stresses me, why would I not be using a tool that's been proven to work CONSTANTLY?
I don't know, but I bet it's related to the reason that we don't exercise regularly even though we know that it's good for us and has positive long-term results. The reason we eat junk despite same. The reason we make short term decisions in our relationships that we know will have negative impacts in the long run.
If I were pressed into a corner and told that I HAVE TO come up with an answer about why I'd not implement a system that I know works to solve a problem I know I have? I'd guess that it has something to do with LIKING indulging Maurice. It feels good to my brain to go from thing to thing. It's like the world is a giant playground for it, and making it stay on the slide all day doesn't seem fair.
And there might be a bit of what one of my friends described as "fear of being too regimented". I understand that; who wants to be boring? People who do the same thing every day are boring, right? And if I lock myself into a routine that has me doing what I'm actually supposed to do every day, doesn't that reduce my freedom? And isn't freedom the primary thing I've worked for all these years?
And as long as we're really digging, is it possible that I don't do things that would have a life-changing long-term outcome because I'm afraid that I'll discover that the really focused me isn't all that great after all? Or that it's so great that it will force me to work even harder to do even bigger and better things? That I fear that a really healthy Vena might not be all that hot, or in the reverse that she might be so amazing that she has no excuses for not doing scary things like going on fitness vacations? That fear of failure, or fear of success, drive a lot of the seemingly bad decisions (but also seemingly semi-conscious) decisions we make every day?
Ouch--all too much to process on this already-busy morning.
But if you have a problem with focusing on tasks, try out the music thing; there’s a free trial option on Focus at will. Follow
the instructions. Let me know how it works for you.
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