Trying to focus in the presence of so many distractions can be extremely difficult. If you’re not accustomed to working while avoiding these distractions, you’ll find yourself veering away from your work constantly.
Even those who have worked in the presence of these distractions for years find themselves unable to focus sometimes. In order for you to get used to working with these types of distractions, you should use timers and other such tools to carve out more time for yourself to work, and slowly adapt to your new situation.
If you’re unable to focus because of all the distractions present, then ideally you’d be able to just block them all out and solely focus on work. However, some people just aren’t capable of doing that, and in such a case, you should be able to use timing tools to allocate larger and larger amounts of time to work before you return to whatever was previously distracting you.
For example, a simple timer on your phone or even a physical timer if it goes high enough, can be set to go off after whatever length of time you’d like, so you can start off with something as low as 15 minutes of work at a time.
Each day, move it up by small increments, like five minutes or so, and eventually you’ll be more comfortable working for extended periods of time. Instead of freely flowing back and forth between distractions and work where things can get a bit muddled, you’re allowing yourself to dedicate a certain amount of time entirely to work, so that you’re not allowing any of the distractions to interfere.
Eventually you’ll get so used to having the two of them be separate that you won’t need a timer at all, but rather you’ll just work for a certain amount of time and then be done for the day.
Timers can also be used in the reverse way. If you want to work consistently and give yourself some downtime if you’re not getting enough, then set a timer for a small amount of time during which you can avoid focusing on work and actually enjoy some time off.
Many people end up doing too much of one or the other. Some are too distracted and spend too much time relaxing, while others work themselves so hard that they inevitably get burnt out. You need to have a bit of time for both during your day, so that you maintain a good work-life balance.
