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Avoid interruptions

One look at an email can rob you of 15 minutes of focus. One call on your cell phone, one tweet, one instant message can destroy your schedule, forcing you to move meetings, or blow off really important things, like love, and friendship, Jacqueline Leo.

Nowadays, mass media, our smartphones, messaging and gaming apps, and social media bombard us with information, communication, and entertainment at an unprecedented rate. They are a blessing, but they are also a curse, an obstacle for learning, working, and growing. How many times have you been working on something and were interrupted by a phone call, a message, an email, or a notification? How often do we try to solve a doubt, get some information, and end up looking at Google and reading something completely unrelated?

Interruptions have always been a common occurrence, but in this era of communication and connectivity, options have multiplied like mosquitos in a swamp, they have indeed reached a new level. They are the most important obstacle for reaching a flow state. They are the enemy of productivity and efficiency. They prevent us from achieving our goals and being successful. The Internet is so big, so powerful and pointless that for some people it is a complete substitute for life, Andrew Brown

The Internet is so big, so powerful and pointless that for some people it is a complete substitute for life, Andrew Brown

Let me suggest a few ways to avoid getting interrupted:

  1. Clear your desk of any unnecessary clutter and anything you are not currently working on: empty water bottles and cans, books, paperwork, flash disks, etc. Be ruthless, keep it clean and well-organized.

    You may also purchase a filling cabinet, a monitor arm, floor lamps, drawer dividers, or office trays to help you better organize your office desk.

  2. Go to a quiet place. Notify your partner, secretary, children, etc., let them know that you are going into your private area and don’t want to be disturbed. If you work in an office, you can put the typical sign “do not disturb me” on the office desk or on the door. Use earplugs and noise-canceling headphones, and listen to classical, instrumental, background music or white noise, anything else with lyrics is likely to be a distraction.

  3. Disconnect. Turn off your phone, tablet, and computer, log out of social media, and turn off the notifications on your phone. Don’t check your e-mail, don’t read text messages, don’t answer phone calls, and don’t talk to anyone. Set a custom voicemail greeting (a special message callers receive when you cannot answer the phone) so you can let callers know you will call them back as soon as you are free and available again.

    Work is hard. Distractions are plentiful. And time is short, Adam Hochschild

    Work is hard. Distractions are plentiful. And time is short, Adam Hochschild

  4. Close all windows and applications that are not necessary for the work at hand, especially those related to social media, messaging (you may want to indicate that you are “absent”), videogames, and email. It is more efficient to read your email in blocks, two or three times a day. Use full screen, distraction-free text editors (Writemonkey, beat, FocusWriter, Vim) or Zen mode (VSCode, Scrivener).

    Cut the distractions and get things done

    Cut the distractions and get things done

  5. Use a calendar. Keep a list in your agenda, note-taking or to-do app (todoist, Any.do, TickTick, Taskwarrior, Sleek, Evernote, or a similar application) with the thoughts, ideas, or tasks that occur to you while you are working that need to be done, but at the moment has little value.

    This serves many purposes. Firstly, you don’t forget important tasks that need to be done. Secondly, you stop worrying about them. Thirdly, you can manage your workload better as you can tell, at any given moment, what you have planned to do, what needs to be prioritized and completed first and what can be done later. Be aware, you should never accept more jobs than you can handle.

    Each day I will accomplish one thing on my to do list, Lailah Gifty Akita

    Each day I will accomplish one thing on my to do list, Lailah Gifty Akita

  6. Establish a daily and weekly work routine that makes the best use of your time, energy, and attention, create time chunks for specific tasks, exercising, and rest. For example, it is far more efficient to answer all your emails and text messages in one go than checking your email account and messaging app every ten minutes or so. Set up folders in your email account and then filter mail automatically into these folders. By doing so, you can also refer to important emails first.

  7. Browse Internet effectively: Use feed aggregators, such as Feedly, Flipboard, Newsflow, NetNewsWire, Newsboat, NewsFlash or NewsBlur, so that you can keep track of all the sites that you are following in one single place.

  8. Do routine work when there are many interruptions and your energy is low. Do not spend much time on mechanical, routine tasks, unimportant things, and unproductive meetings. Work on the most important, highest value tasks when you are at your peak, and also when few interruptions occur. Focus your attention on your current task and forget everything else.

  9. If someone interrupts, talks to you or asks for something, you have the following options: calm down, say no assertively, but gracefully: “Sorry, I can’t listen to you right now. I’m too busy,” “I am really sorry. I’d love to, but I can’t. I just don’t have the time.” Delegate it to someone else, write it down on your calendar, agenda, or to-do list and do it later. Do not jump into a new task unless it is urgent and important. This should be the exception, not the rule.

  10. It is also important to discern when it is time for being connected and when you need to unplug and have quality time with your partner, children, family, and friends. Don’t multi-task when you are with them. Devote time to your loved ones, focus on them exclusively because you and they deserve it! You have only one life left, enjoy it, make the most of it!

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