8 Ways to Stay Focused When You May Want to be Other Places
Wouldn’t it be great if everything we had to do was exciting, rewarding, and engaged all of our senses? Of course it would, but reality doesn’t quite work that way. We all have tasks, routines, chores that run the gamut of meh to mundane, to plain boring. They aren’t called chores for nothing. Getting through some of those types of tasks to reap the rewards that tend to come later can be a challenge to stay focused on when they come up. Even when you know that it will lead to better things, it can still be difficult to buckle down and get it done.
There are some things you can do that will assist in working through those challenging tasks that feel like they might never end. Setting yourself up for these portions of goal achievement or task completion will ensure you can accomplish what needs to happen. Let’s take a look at eight ways you can stay focused when you’d rather be somewhere else or doing something more fun.
1. Banish distractions
Close out everything else. Turn off notifications. Remove or close out all social media sites. Remove the easy temptations or things that will pull your eyes or ears away from the work at hand. You may choose to listen to some music if that is not distracting to you. Instrumental music can be a great way to block out noises without pulling your attention towards catchy lyrics. You can even find some upbeat songs that will infuse energy into your work, but stay enough in the background to keep you moving right along. With every other beep or bing blocked out, the music can help you still feel connected to other things.
2. Energy management
You know yourself better than anyone. Are you someone that caffeine helps to spur a little energy? A small dose of a soda, coffee, or energy drink can be helpful depending on how it impacts you. Hunger can also be a distraction; know your body and the timing of the work you’re doing, and plan to eat a meal or snack before you want to do deep work. Not only can hunger be a distraction, the thought of food can become another excuse to procrastinate the work and go grab a bite to eat. Take that potential barrier away up front.
3. Be rested
Ensuring you are well rested is a great way to enable the energy you’ll need when the time comes. This is also a reason to have a weekly plan to know which nights may be more important than others to get that extra wink of sleep. If you have mundane work to do in the afternoon, perhaps you can plan for a short (no more than 20 minutes) nap to refresh your mind and your energy.
4. Have a plan for what you will accomplish
Block your time for this type of focused or boring work. With time established for the task or tasks, you will know how long you have to work. Next is to know what you will do with that time. I have always found that I am way more productive working from a specific list of items when I have the time set aside for it. Without the list, I usually find out at the end of the time I only accomplished a small bit of the work I intended. Break your tasks down as far as reasonable, and check the items off as you go. Seeing the checkmarks next to each task can build momentum for accomplishing even more.
5. Batch like items together
When you have similar items that need to be completed, do them at the same time. This can help you get into a rhythm for the work and increase your efficiency in completing those items. Hitting that groove can become motivational in seeing how much you are getting done in the same sitting.
6. Change locations
Do your focused work someplace different from where you do other types of projects. If you sit at a desk for managing email, taking calls, or small tasks, moving to a different space when you need to complete your planning, research, or write notes on activities in your location can be very helpful to get into a different frame of mind. I know many location leaders who do their deeper work at a nearby coffee shop or restaurant to avoid the distraction happening in their store. They complete performance updates, review weekly reports, or plan out their week away from the office space they have in the store. This may be helpful for you as well.
7. Set a reward for accomplishing specific tasks
When faced with boring or tedious tasks, setting a reward of something fun and interesting to you can serve as the right motivation to work through the tougher tasks on your plate. The rewards don’t have to be big, and should be relative to the project you need to work on. It likely will not work to your favor to have a boring twenty minute task rewarded with the rest of the day off to go play golf. But for some larger or particularly grueling tasks, giving yourself time and permission to hit the links might be worth it. More often, something like 15 minutes of relaxing and scrolling through social media will be enough. Or grab a drink and snack and relax for ten minutes. Connect the two together, relative to one another, and you’ll build a nice system for yourself and the more monotonous tasks you face.
8. Don’t multitask
Multitasking is a myth, and it certainly is when you’re trying to work through deep work or unexciting tasks. Stick to the task at hand, and you may find that you can get through the work much faster than expected because of that focus on the one area. This connects directly back to number one above, get rid of the distractions around you and be singularly concentrated on the task in front of you.
There is never anyone foolproof way to work through the most difficult of tasks. Each person will find different things boring or challenging to work through, due to interest. These tips can help prepare you ahead of time for the mental and sometimes physical barriers in the way of tacking mundane or routine tasks, no matter how important they may be. And, when you are complete, you know it will feel good to have them done and out of the way.
What ideas do you have for working through your most grueling of every day tasks?
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