Finding Focus in a World of Distractions

A few years ago, I began to observe something in my own behavior that made me uncomfortable. From the moment I woke up until the end of the day, my life was a series of screens. I started my day with my phone, watching cooking videos on Instagram and bouncing between apps. Then, while cooking breakfast, I focused on my iPad next to the oven. My work involved multiple screens, and my smartwatch constantly beeped and distracted me. But the worst offender was my phone. I could waste hours on it every day. So, I decided to limit my phone use to just 30 minutes a day for a month as an experiment.

After about a week, I noticed three significant changes: my attention span improved, I had more ideas, and I made more plans. This experiment sparked my curiosity about what it takes to focus in a world full of distractions. I delved into hundreds of research papers, met with experts, and conducted more experiments on myself, compiling 25,000 words of research notes about how technology affects our attention.

When we work in front of a computer, especially with a phone nearby, we focus on one thing for just 40 seconds before switching tasks. This decreases to 35 seconds if we have messaging apps like Slack open. The root cause of our distraction isn't just that we're distracted—our brains are overstimulated and crave distraction. Our brains love the tiny nuggets of information from social media and email, rewarding us with dopamine, the same pleasure chemical released when eating pizza or making love. This overstimulation creates a state where our minds constantly seek distraction.

Curious about the effects of reducing stimulation further, I decided to make myself bored for an hour a day for a month, asking readers of my website for the most boring activities they could think of. I read the iTunes terms and conditions, waited on hold with Air Canada's baggage claims department, counted zeros in the first 10,000 digits of pi, and watched a clock tick for an hour, among other activities.

The results were similar to my phone experiment: after about a week, my attention span grew, and I had more ideas and plans. With less stimulation, my mind didn't seek distraction and had more opportunities to wander and come up with new ideas. This phenomenon, which I call "scatter focus," occurs when our minds wander to the past, present, and future, especially focusing on the future 48% of the time.

This mind-wandering allows us to connect ideas and make plans. Simple activities that let our minds wander, like knitting, taking long showers, or walking without using our phones, can enhance our creativity and productivity. We need to create more space for our minds to wander and reduce overstimulation.

We need to shift our perspective on attention. Instead of trying to fit more into our days, we should focus on creating more mental space. Distraction is a symptom of overstimulation, not the enemy of focus. I challenge you to make your mind less stimulated for two weeks and observe the changes. Use features on your devices to limit wasted time, establish disconnection rituals, and rediscover boredom. By calming our minds, we can improve our focus, creativity, and overall quality of life.

The state of our attention determines the state of our lives. By reducing stimulation and allowing our minds to wander, we can live more focused, productive, and fulfilling lives.