A Word About Distraction

We live in a world of distraction. It seems all these things we’ve “gained” in recent years, have proven less helpful than we thought they might be.

I think if we took an honest assessment of where we are, we might have a bit of buyers remorse. Rather than our lives being simplified, they are full of noise, with devises and screens jockeying for our attention in each crevice and corner of our lives.

I came upon this quote from Henry Thoreau. He of course is not a modern person, he lived in the mid-1800’s. And yet, his observation about distraction is as relevant today as it was seemingly then, perhaps more so.

He said this,

“Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end, an end which it was already but too easy to arrive at..”

In our Monday team meetings, we always begin with a moment of motivation, some encouraging word to help jump-start the week. The topic this morning was distraction, how things distract us from, to borrow Thoreau’s words, “serious things.”

One of our team members, Rachael Schafer, seems to be fighting this fight against distraction in a more advanced way than the rest of us. At the very least she’s understood her temptation well — to be distracted by her phone and all the notifications that come with it — and has developed strategies and rhythms to help guard her from a distracted mind.

On our call this morning Rachael shared how she is using some new functionality on her phone to help in this process. There is a new FOCUS function on the iPhone that helps.

Here are two takeaways from what she shared.

DETERMINE

Determine who you want to hear from during your workday. The FOCUS function allows users to choose who can call and who can’t. Limiting what calls you’re able to take during the day does two things: first, it helps regulate who you talk to during the workday, recognizing not every call is a call for working hours; and second, it helps train your friends and family not to interrupt you during working hours.

I don’t know this, but it’s my hunch that Rachael doesn’t receive many calls now-a-days from others during working hours, at this point, they know not to call.

SIFT

Sift through what notifications you want to come through. This is another function of FOCUS. It allows you to choose which notifications you want to see.

Some notifications on your phone are very helpful and important, others, well not so much. Find the notifications that are important, discard the others.

Stay focused friends! Limit distraction and do your best now.