How to Concentrate on What You’re Doing

by Bradley Nice, Content Manager at ClickHelp.com — software documentation tool

Getting organized, conquering procrastination and creating a distraction-free workspace while being true to yourself.

Ever found yourself in a situation when you have to make something done, but for some reason you just can’t focus even for a few minutes, getting distracted and slowed down by everything?

I’ve got something for you then. I won’t cover anything long-term here, like making yourself better through yoga and meditation. I also won’t tell you how to optimize your daily routine and bring your life in order (sorry), but you might apply some of the tips for this purpose as well. Instead, I’d like to give you more of a short-term tricks, instant tips, if you will. So that you can apply them instantly to deal with the current problem.

Let’s get one thing straight, while we haven’t dived too deep: everything about how you approach your tasks depends on your personality, and there are very few universal tips somebody can give you. That’s why I’m going to break these tips apart and review them from different perspectives.

To plan or not to plan?

Most of the articles you’ll read will advise you to plan everything you’re going to do ahead of time. Keep the schedule, set reminders — such kind of stuff. But it actually heavily depends on the type of the person you are, as I’ve already pointed out. Yes, it can help you if you are a disciple of Ordnung, but if you’re kind of chaotic that won’t help you a bit. You’ll end up torturing yourself and further decreasing your efficiency.

Of course, no harm in trying — make lists/plans a couple of times, try sticking to them, completing your task bit by bit. But if you fail at following them time after time, then you’re probably better off without them — and you should act on impulse.

Breaking things down

An interested reader can ask: “Yeah, it’s easy enough to make a list of several tasks. But what if I have just one? How do I make a list of that?”

True enough, I said I’ll help you with an imminent task, not your daily routine. And I’m going to, that’s why here’s the next tip:

Try breaking the thing you’re about to do into smaller tasks, if that’s possible. And believe me, nine times out of ten it’s possible. Even seemingly simple thing like washing dishes can be broken further down into smaller ones:

• Wash cutlery
• Wash small plates
• Wash large plates
• Wash bowls
• Wash cooking pot

See? If you’ll be checking those positions one by one off the list, you’ll be able to see your progress more clearly. After washing all the cutlery you’ll be able to tell that you’ve completed some part of your task; opposed to washing one fork, one pot and one plate — in this case you’ll most likely feel like you didn’t achieve anything.

Easy start

You might’ve noticed (even if you didn’t — don’t worry) that in my example above the “sub-tasks” are in order of increasing difficulty. And that’s not just a coincidence — that’s a whole new tip.

If you start off with the hardest thing there is on your list (or in your mind, doesn’t matter), you can spend a lot of time on that and feel frustrated in the end, because you spent so much time and there are still plenty of things to do. Start with something simpler — in my example, the cutlery, and work your way upwards. In your case you can consider cutlery the hardest thing to do — that’s perfectly okay. As I’ve said couple of times already — it depends on you. Find what’ll be easy for you.

Yes, it’s a dump, but it’s my dump

Another useful tip that you’ve probably heard before is uncluttering your desk, removing everything that might draw and misdirect your attention. On one hand it’s logical — if there are less things that can distract you, the higher the chance that you’ll be doing what actually needs done.

But on the other hand, if you’re used to your ‘creative clutter’, clearing out your workplace can distract you even more — you’ll feel less comfortable, and probably more tense. So instead of decluttering or making rearrangements on your desk, make it yours. Put everything in the order that suits you, so you’ll feel comfortable while working.

One thing is worth putting away, though — it’s your phone/tablet (of course, if you don’t need them for your task). Constantly checking it is a modern-age disease, that can consume quite an amount of time and distract you more often than not. Also, put it in a do-not-disturb mode, so you won’t have an excuse to look at it when a notification dings.

Isolation

But distracting can be not only things that depend on you, but the world around you as well. Passing transport, people shouting in the street or even colleagues speaking can throw you off track.

So it might be a good idea to isolate yourself from the rest of the world. If it’s not physically possible, then do it other ways. One of which can be turning on music and putting on headphones. Just be sure not to make it too loud — it can distract other people as well (and hurt your hearing at high volumes). But again — see for yourself if this one suits you, because sometimes music acts in a completely opposite way — it distracts you even more. You start singing along (silently), twitching your leg to a rhythm or something like that; in this case try something more neutral — like a sound of forest or rain. There are a lot of apps and websites that allow you to listen to ‘white noise’. I won’t go into details here, but I just might write a separate article on those. Leave a comment below, if you’re interested.

A little bit of doing nothing

And last, but not the least — take breaks. Yes, you can do your task in one sitting if it doesn’t take much time. But if it does, don’t torture yourself, don’t think that taking a small break will distract you or break your concentration. After all, procrastination is not always bad — you can read a whole article on that by our own Amanda Johnson. Just be sure to make these breaks short. Five minutes every hour or half an hour, from my experience, is more that enough.

That being said, I hope you’ve learned something useful that will help you get things done quicker, in a more efficient way. Feel free to comment on what you’re doing to battle procrastination and to get things done.

Have a nice day!

Bradley Nice, Content Manager at ClickHelp.com — best online documentation tool for SaaS vendors