You walk into your study, the light flips on to a somewhat dimmed setting that is just right for your eyes to focus on the page in front of you. You sit in your favorite chair, its time to get to work. Twenty minutes goes by and you’re just starting to taste a bit of focus developing when there’s a knock at the door. It’s a package you ordered a few days prior. All is well, that’s taken care of and now we’re back. Thirty minutes in now and your focus has really begun to catch a tune. The phone rings. It’s your friend and he wants to talk about the petunias he just planted in his garden. An hour goes by and we’re back at the desk ready to go but this time we’ve stopped to make ourselves a cup of tea. Thirty minutes in and you sense you’re really coming around the corner with your newfound focus.
Our attention is demanded in so many different ways over the period of an entire day or even just in one hour. It always seems to us that with some luck the demands begin to trickle in as soon as we settle in to our study. Tending to all of these distractions will surely leave us in a bind. If we conduct ourselves in this manner our brains become less capable of maintaining a proper bead of focus. These constant breaks of focus can come from many different angles, it doesn’t always have to be Joe calling to talk about his petunia garden.
We must be more selective about how and when we allow our focus to be snipped like a taut string of yarn. If we make habit of breaking this focus when it arrives we are shooting ourselves in the foot. It may be worth considering all the ways in which we allow our focus to be broken during our bouts of study. I can personally conjure up a few off of the top of my head without much effort. In studying these distractions we can work to minimize them. Not everything requires our immediate action or response and this is an important factor that we must learn to utilize in our work if we intend to go far.
I wish for you success, growth, and happiness friend. Take care!
Jordan Hutchison 