Distracted

I surprised by the fact that I hadn't posted in a few days, but to be honest I've been a bit busy just taking care of other things around here. In this crazy everything needs your attention now world, we tend to get distracted by nonsense. (Or at least I think of it as nonsense.) The phone rings all day, email notices pop-up; or  my favorite co-workers and family members dropping in with nothing important to say while I'm in the middle of something. It's this kinda stuff that can ruin a normal schedule. 

But what can you do? 

For me I try and give my undivided attention to whomever drops by the office. In my situation I work from home but I have a dedicated separate office. Although the kinds of distractions I get are mostly from family. The good thing is my adult kids are pretty good about knocking first before entering. If only I can just get my lovely, dear, endearing wife to do that. 

When it comes to phone calls, since I work for me, I pretty tight about screening calls. If it's a client, sure I'll answer, but my biggest problem is sales calls. If I could only educate these individuals on sending me short, to the point emails or mail packets instead of cold calling. Because I set aside my early mornings and late afternoons for those things, I actually do read emails. 

Another thing I've learned is to take breaks. I was fortunate in the fact that my last regular employer was very good about giving breaks. They also were not the type to hover around the water cooler timing their employees. They had enough respect for their employees that they knew they were professionals and would take their allotted time.

In my current situation I have to be careful not to fall into the trap of letting myself got too distracted and just taking the morning off. I have found that when I'm starting to struggle with something, that's usually the time I need to head toward the porch and break. By doing that, I allow my mind to clear and soon after, the problem I was struggling with turns into a simple task. 

That maybe a simple way of concluding this thought. By giving yourself a chance to decompress and walk away from tasks for a moment, you allow yourself some stress relief. Another thought is to give yourself as few distractions as possible. Years ago it was nothing for me to play the radio at work and take every call was it arrived. But since my work has shifted to more writing and in-depth research, I've discovered no noises and a very quiet ringer for my phone allow me a deeper focus on the tasks at hand. 

But these things are just suggestions, you find what works for you, To be truly more productive, we have to be in a good place. Because if we are uncomfortable with where we are, that in itself can be the biggest distraction of them all. Now I think I'll take a walk.