If you were struggling, you couldn’t escape to the worlds of Facebook, YouTube and Netflix for instant relief.
How do I know?
Because I was born before 1985. I know what it feels like to be a student with and without the Internet.
While your video game was loading, you had time to think:
“Is this the best use of my time? Why am I avoiding this task? What am I scared of? Failure? Looking stupid? Am I just confused and overwhelmed?”
Pauses were built into the day to help you reflect on your behaviour (what you should and shouldn’t be doing).
But these days, with super fast Internet and mobile phones, pauses are nowhere to be seen. Most of us find ourselves in a constant state of restless idleness, switching rapidly from one task to the next.
As Michael Harris, author of The End of Absence, states:
“When teens work on their homework … a full two thirds of them are multitasking. If need be, they can simultaneously text, watch music videos, groom their Facebook page, and play Call of Duty, all while positioning up an essay on Hamlet.”
Struggling to write that Hamlet essay? No worries. You can toggle between Word and Facebook in less than a second. Boom! Instant rewards! Instant relief!
And this is how procrastination and multitasking become deeply ingrained (bad) habits.
Research shows that when you work this way …
By inserting a pause button into your life.
A pause button can help you to stop and reflect before you do something that you’ll later regret. It can help you re-focus and get back on track.
The pause button I’m talking about isn’t something you’ll be able to find on ebay or Amazon. You’ll need to create your own pause button.
The thing about your pause button is that it doesn’t need to be anything fancy. You could go on a free image site like Pixabay and print one out.
Or you could get creative and draw one on a sheet of paper. Decorate it with glitter, stickers, crayons, etc. Frame it if you want. You want to personalise it. Own it. This button (if you use it) is going to deliver you to greater productivity levels and focus.
Once you’ve got your pause button, stick it up on your wall. Make it far away enough so you need to take a few steps to get there.
Every time you feel the urge to procrastinate by switching to a more enjoyable task (e.g. Facebook), walk over to the pause button and hit it.
Now here’s the important part …
Your next small step may be:
• Have a drink of water
• Write one more sentence
• Set a timer and keep going for another five minutes
If you hit the pause button and think, “I really need a 5 minute break. I’m not getting anywhere with this …”, then no problem! Take a break. But be intentional about it and place a time limit on it (e.g. “I’m going for a 5 minute walk”).
Let me make it clear: taking breaks after doing some solid work is not procrastination. Never confuse relaxing with procrastination. You’re not a machine. You need to pace yourself. Breaks help you manage your energy levels so you can tackle your work with a refreshed, clear mind.
The act of getting up and walking over to your pause button will require a bit of willpower to start with. Initially, it may feel forced, strange and a little bit silly hitting a piece of paper on your wall. But persevere. The more times you hit that pause button, the sooner it will become a habit.
Once you kick the bad habit of multitasking and procrastination, you’ll find your brain will be less stressed. This in turn will make it easier for you to study and retain important information.
While everyone around you is freaking out because they’ve left their work until the last minute, you’ll be feeling calm and in control.
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Efficiency was the name of the game.
In an attempt to be ‘time smart’, I started ordering my groceries online and having them delivered straight to my door.
Yes, it was convenient.
Yes, it was efficient.
But over time, I saw that this convenience and efficiency came at a cost.
I’m not talking about the $20 monthly subscription fee to the supermarket. I’m talking about the cost to my lived human experience.
Earlier this year, I realised that by having my groceries delivered, I was missing out on a lot of valuable micro-interactions.
I was depriving myself of experiences that made me feel connected to other people and my community.
You may be thinking, “Yeah, big deal, Jane! Don’t you have better things to do with your time than grocery shopping?”
My younger ‘optimised’ self would have thought so. And that’s certainly what the Big Tech companies want you to believe. Big tech wants you to believe that a good life is an optimised life and one that is friction-free.
While I used to think grocery shopping was a waste of my time, I don’t think this way anymore.
Shopping for food in person at your local farmers’ market, bulk food store, or supermarket is an experience worth having. It’s time well spent.
Besides acquiring the best fresh produce and ingredients, the in-person shopping experience offers unexpected micro-interactions.
Here’s an example of what I’m talking about . . .
Last week, I popped into a new supermarket to pick up a few items. I was looking for plant-based sausages, but after going all around the store, I couldn’t find them. I knew I needed help.
I approached a young employee who was busily stacking tubs of hummus in a refrigerator. I asked her if she knew where the vegan products were.
She said, “Oh, I think you’ll find them over here” and then she took off like a rocket. I was practically running with my shopping cart to keep up with her.
I said to her, “Wow, you walk really fast!”
To which she said, “Oh… sorry!”
I said, “No, don’t apologise! I think it’s great!”
We arrived at the plant-based sausages, I thanked her, and she sped off again.
This brief social interaction probably lasted less than 60 seconds, but it made my day. It got my heart rate up and put a smile on my face.
I felt inspired by her young person energy. It also dawned on me that I could probably push myself a little harder in my next workout session.
I’m not exaggerating when I say my life was enriched by this tiny social interaction. Had I just ordered my plant-based sausages online, I would have missed out on this joyous experience.
This experience got me thinking about why I love talking to complete strangers so much. Unless I encounter a total grump, I usually always leave the interaction feeling better than before.
I was curious. Had any research been done on this?
It turns out quite a bit!
Dr Gillian Sandstrom has written a book that explores the many benefits of talking to strangers. It’s called Once Upon a Stranger: The Science of How “Small” Talk Can Add Up To a Big Life.
In an interview, Dr Sandstrom explains some of the benefits of talking to strangers. She states:
“The first benefit that we’ve found consistently is just that it puts you in a good mood. When you talk to a stranger, you usually walk away feeling a bit happier and more connected, which we know is so important for humans.
Another thing from the research is that we tend to learn more than we expect to when we talk to strangers. It brings novelty into our life, makes our life richer. There’s research about how well-being can arise from not only happiness, purpose, and meaning, but this third source: psychological richness. I think talking to strangers gives you richness, because it brings novelty and learning and those kinds of things into your life.”
Famous author Kurt Vonnegut understood this psychological richness that came from talking to strangers out in the world (not online).
He could foresee the problems associated with technology back in 2005 (well before social media, online shopping, and generative AI became widely adopted).
In a PBS interview, Vonnegut tells a story about going to the shops to purchase a single envelope.
Before leaving the house, his wife says to Vonnegut:
“You’re not a poor man. You know, why don’t you go online and buy a hundred envelopes and put them in the closet?”
Vonnegut continues the story, telling the PBS interviewer:
“I pretend not to hear her. And go out to get an envelope because I’m going to have a hell of a good time in the process of buying one envelope.
I meet a lot of people. And, see some great looking babes. And a fire engine goes by. And I give them the thumbs up. And, and ask a woman what kind of dog that is. And, and I don’t know…
And, of course, the computers will do us out of that. And, what the computer people don’t realize, or they don’t care, is we’re dancing animals. You know, we love to move around. And, we’re not supposed to dance at all anymore.”
The ‘Computer people’ Vonnegut referred to are the Tech bros of today. They have designed apps that have made us addicted, isolated, and lonely.
But we don’t have to go down this path. We have a choice.
Instead of choosing convenience, efficiency, and comfort, we can choose real contact with the world and people.
This is why I am resisting using AI. It’s why I don’t use any social media. It’s also why I have now gone back to buying my groceries in person and avoid the self-service checkouts as much as possible (even if it means waiting in line for five minutes).
Sometimes the checkout person is dead tired and doesn’t want to talk (which is fair enough). Or I’ll try to strike up a conversation and the other person doesn’t want to talk (this is rare, but it does happen).
You also need to be careful about who you choose to strike up a conversation with. Some people can be dangerous and unhinged, but in my experience, most people are kind and friendly.
If you have concerns about ‘Stranger Danger’, Dr Sandstrom suggests:
“Choose a situation that feels safe, such as a public place in broad daylight with plenty of people around.”
She goes on to add:
“In my life, instead of being a danger, strangers have been game changers.”
I couldn’t agree more.
Even if you do end up talking to someone who is a grump or not in the mood for a chat, you’ll learn something about yourself and the human experience.
By resisting the pull to be efficient and by seeking out micro-interactions, your life will be a whole lot richer. As Kurt Vonnegut once said: “We are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anyone tell you any different.”
For context, she was a sales manager who used a BlackBerry phone for work (a fancy, expensive device at the time).
Every minute of the interview, her phone pinged with a notification or she received an email alert on her laptop. She’d glance at one of her devices and, with a panicked look, say, “I need to answer this!”
It was an awkward and disjointed conversation, full of stops and starts. I have to admit, her behaviour annoyed me. I soon realised I wasn’t the only person feeling this way.
The sales manager mentioned that she had a 4-year-old daughter who would get upset with her.
She told me that her little girl would beg her to put her phone and computer away. She’d tug at her clothes and cry, “Mummy! Mummy! Put your phone away!”
I appreciated this woman’s honesty, especially when she said to me:
“On the weekend, I’m with my kids but not truly with them… if you know what I mean”.
I knew exactly what she meant.
That was over 10 years ago. Fast forward to today, and we’re all a bit like that sales manager. But things are a lot worse now.
Instead of being overwhelmed and distracted by phone calls and work emails, we’re dealing with powerful Big Tech companies that hijack our time, energy, and attention.
They’ve made us weak-willed and impulsive.
We’re now in a position where distraction is something we crave rather than put up with.
When we have a gap in our schedule or we have to wait in line, what do most of us do? We reach for our phones without even thinking.
Rather than be alone with our thoughts, we desperately try to fill the space with ‘phone snacks’.
When we feel confused, frustrated, or bored, we run to our devices to escape the discomfort and our brains reward us for doing so.
Every time we switch tasks, our brain releases a little shot of dopamine.
It’s these quick hits of dopamine that train us to crave checking our phones and, ultimately, multitasking.
In an environment of unrestricted tech use, my brain is like a wild monkey. It wants to run around, make a mess, and explore many different things all at once.
I can relate to Dr Nancy Colier when she writes in The Power of Off, the mind on technology is like a “wild, locked-up monkey that’s drunk two bottles of wine chased by a shot of Scotch and been stung by a whole swarm of bees”.
When I start multitasking (and it doesn’t take much to get me going), I feel amped up, frenzied, and agitated. My energy feels a little crazy.
Research shows that as we quickly switch from one task to another, we rapidly deplete our finite mental resources and put our brains under a lot of stress.
But it gets worse . . .
When we multitask, we also experience what researcher Sophie Leroy calls Attention Residue.
In a research paper called Why is it so hard to do my work? Leroy explains Attention Residue as the extent to which your attention is only partially focused on the current activity because a prior activity (the task you rapidly switched from) is still holding part of your attention.
Why does this matter?
Leroy’s research found that when you experience Attention Residue, your performance suffers.
It’s as if you’ve taken a big dollop of the previous task and put a thick slather of it all over the current task, thereby making a mess of the present moment.
The good news is we can stop messing with our precious moments by focusing on one task at a time.
In his excellent book Time Surfing, Zen Monk Paul Loomans encourages us to focus on one task at a time, with minimal interruptions, and do it until completion. He says if we do this, we will experience a sense of calm and pleasure in everything we do.
Even tasks we consider boring or mundane (e.g., peeling potatoes or cleaning your room) can be transformed into artistry when you are truly present.
Part of the problem is that we’re often in a rush to get to the next thing on our to-do lists. But as Loomans warns, “Rushing is like gulping down time. You’re not living for now but for later”.
To counter this frenetic urge to race ahead, Loomans suggests that we accept whatever we are doing as “the activity of the moment”. In other words, we view the task before us as the most important thing we can be doing in this moment and we forget the rest.
It’s a simple but powerful mental shift.
I’ve noticed that when I accept whatever I am doing as the thing I should be doing right now, I no longer feel the urge to work with such intense energy. I feel calmer. An added bonus is that when I slow down, I make fewer mistakes and tend to do a better job.
At the heart of it, doing one thing at a time means showing up to life and being present, to the good stuff but also the painful, boring bits.
If you find yourself reaching for your phone more than you’d like, ask yourself this question:
“Am I reaching for my phone to escape the present moment?”
For me, the answer is usually yes. I’m trying to avoid the discomfort of life. But life tends to be more meaningful and enjoyable when I stay fully present to what’s happening around me, with my phone out of sight.
Technology will dominate your life, and multitasking will be an issue unless you have strategies to protect your time, energy, and attention.
What motivates me to set limits on my tech use (specifically my phone) is a desire to feel calm, grounded, and focused. I also want to live a life of substance, not one in which I am constantly chasing instant gratification.
Here are the strategies that I am currently practising to help me decrease multitasking and cultivate calm:
When I’m with someone or working on an important task, I put my phone away and keep it out of sight. I want to be fully present with the person I’m with or the task at hand. Why?
Because attention is how we show others they matter.
When someone is checking their phone in a social situation, it communicates “I’m more interested in what’s happening on this screen than I am in you”.
When I think back to the interview with the sales manager, it would have been a better experience for everyone if she had put her phone on silent, left it in her bag, and closed her laptop.
There would have been fewer times saying “What was the question again?” and “Sorry, I can’t remember what we were talking about”.
We probably would have felt more connected, too.
Note: Even when my phone isn’t within arm’s reach, I can still catch myself rapidly switching between web browsers and tasks. However, I’ve noticed that my multitasking significantly increases when my phone is within arm’s reach.
You’ve probably heard of intermittent fasting, where you have a window for eating (e.g., 10am to 6pm). But have you heard of phone fasting?
Phone fasting is a period during the day when your phone is not within reach.
As TJ Power states in The Dose Effect:
“A phone fast enables your dopamine to replenish and creates the opportunity for connection and restoration.”
So, as an experiment, for 30 days, I phone fasted from 8pm until 12noon the next day (allowing myself to make urgent calls if needed). I discovered that this made a big difference to my ability to focus. I also experienced a sense of calm like never before.
At the start of the day, I create a ‘Wish List’ (another wonderful concept from Paul Looman’s Time Surfing book).
I write down all the things I’d like to do in the day, but there’s no pressure to do all of them. I then put the list away, and depending on how I feel, I listen to my intuition and trust myself to choose the right activity to begin with.
Before I start a work session, I also declare what I intend to do (e.g., “Chop vegetables for curry” or “Write for 45 minutes”). If possible, I also like to share what I plan to do with another human (I use an online coworking community called Cave Day to do this).
After every 25-30 minutes of work, I aim to take a short movement break (usually 2-5 minutes in duration). This helps me to stay energised and alert. But most importantly, it gives me a brain boost.
What I wish I had understood when I was younger is that you can’t focus for hours on end. It’s not humanly possible because your brain has a finite amount of attentional resources. This means as you focus on doing a task, your attentional resources get depleted (and if you multitask, you accelerate the depletion even more!).
However, research shows you can boost your attentional resources by taking short breaks or, as Paul Loomans likes to call them, ‘breathers’.
A ‘breather’ is any activity that allows you to get out of your head and grounded in your body.
Some of my favourite breather activities include going for a short walk, chopping vegetables, or riding my bike to pick up a package from the post office. These activities allow my brain and thoughts to roam free.
Although many of us default to checking our phones during breaks, resist the urge. The problem with using your phone on a break is that you’re still in your head. This means you’re churning through your attentional resources instead of replenishing them.
The sense of calm and pleasure I experience when I stop multitasking and focus on doing one thing at a time is second to none.
But in the age of the Attention Economy, with so many companies trying to hijack our attention, it takes discipline and practice to stay focused.
Without strategies in place to protect your focus, the default will be multitasking and its friends – chaos, stress, and fatigue.
We may not have a 4-year-old child tugging on our clothes when we’re using our phones. But perhaps we should all listen to the wisdom of that little girl and put our phones away.
On these days, the temptation to procrastinate and distract oneself can be strong.
I recently spent a few days with my family in the countryside, where I enjoyed reading by a crackling fire. But when I found myself back home in my office, I struggled to get back into the swing of things.
I was experiencing a full-blown holiday comedown.
For some context, I had printed out the slides for an upcoming presentation that I needed to practise, but I felt resistance every time I looked at the slides.
My mind screamed, “Nooo! I don’t want to practise!”. Without even thinking, I kept pushing the slides away like a toddler smooshing their vegetables around on their plate.
But at some point, I caught myself in the act. Without berating myself, I managed to turn things around and ease into my practice.
In this blog, I’ll share a couple of simple strategies I use to get a better handle on my procrastination and overcome resistance.
According to Procrastination scholar Tim Pychyl, procrastination isn’t a time management issue. It’s an emotion management issue. If you can get a better handle on your emotions, you’ll have a better handle on procrastination.
Let’s unpack this…
Often, when we procrastinate, it’s because we’re trying to avoid experiencing negative emotions. The task we need to do brings up feelings of discomfort (e.g., boredom, fear, guilt, anxiety, and stress), so we avoid the task to make ourselves feel better.
But avoidance makes no sense when you think about it.
Oliver Burkeman explains the problems associated with avoidance in his book Meditations for Mortals. He writes:
“The more you organise your life around not addressing the things that make you anxious, the more likely they are to develop into serious problems – and even if they don’t, the longer you fail to confront them, the more unhappy time you spend being scared of what might be lurking in the places you don’t want to go. It’s ironic that this is known, in self-help circles, as ‘remaining in your comfort zone’, because there’s nothing comfortable about it. In fact, it entails accepting a constant background tug of discomfort – an undertow of worry that can sometimes feel useful or virtuous, though it isn’t – as the price you pay to avoid a more acute spike of anxiety.”
Dutch Zen Monk Paul Loomans labels the tasks we avoid as ‘gnawing rats’. He says these tasks “eat away at you under the surface”.
Have you noticed that whenever you try to avoid a task, it’s usually still on your mind, using up your precious mental resources?
That’s what Loomans means by the task eating away at you under the surface.
Why does he use the peculiar term ‘gnawing rat’? Looman’s daughter used to have pet rats that would eat loudly under his bed, keeping him awake at night.
Loomans explains that if you can befriend your gnawing rats, you can transform them into white sheep. Just like a white sheep follows you around passively, once you transform a task into a white sheep, it’s a lot easier to make a start.
The question is, how do you transform a ‘gnawing rat’ (a task you are avoiding) into a white sheep?
The key is to approach procrastination from a place of curiosity.
Loomans suggests creating a positive, open relationship with the task you’ve been avoiding. You need to sit with it or visualise the task. Instead of giving yourself a hard time, get curious about why you have such a strained relationship with this task.
Loomans advises:
“… you’re not being asked to immediately do whatever it is that’s gnawing at you. The assignment is only to establish a relationship with it. You let all the various facets sink in and then let them go again.
The rat no longer gnaws at you, and it has settled down. It’s no longer trying to get your attention, but follows quietly behind. It now has white legs and curly fleece – it’s turned into a white sheep.”
I decided to follow Looman’s advice with this presentation I had been avoiding. To begin with, I pulled out my slides and I just sat with them.
I closed my eyes, tuned into my body and asked myself:
“Why am I feeling resistance towards practising this presentation? What’s going on?”
Within 30 seconds, the answer came to me. The resistance came from how I thought I’d feel after doing my speech practice: exhausted and emotionally depleted.
You see, when I practice a presentation, I typically go into turbocharge mode. It’s like I’m delivering the real thing: I gesticulate, project my voice, pace around the room, and rely on my memory and the pictures on my slides to remember the content (I don’t refer to my notes).
All of this takes a lot of mental and physical effort.
So, naturally, when I looked at my slides for this one-hour presentation, I felt flat and heavy.
I equated one hour of presentation practice with having a fried brain by the end.
But then I had a brilliant idea. I thought, “What if this practice session didn’t have to feel like a hard slog? What if it could be fun, light and easy but still effective? What would that look like?”
It immediately occurred to me that I had to shorten my practice session, which brings me to the next strategy . . .
To keep my practice session fun, light and easy, I settled on doing just five minutes of speech practice.
Instead of pacing around my office and practising in turbocharge mode for an hour, I sat myself down with a hot chocolate. I set a timer for five minutes, pulled out a mini whiteboard and started recalling the content (scribbling out and drawing pictures of what I needed to say).
When the timer went off, I checked my notes to see how I went (What did I remember? What did I forget to say?).
Then, I checked in with myself – “How am I feeling after that mini practice session?”. Instead of feeling depleted, I was feeling good! I felt less overwhelmed by this presentation. The resistance had subsided. As Paul Loomans would say, the presentation had transformed from a gnawing rat into a white sheep!
I felt excited, even a little inspired.
I could have easily kept practising for another 10-20 minutes, but I decided to give myself a break to re-energise (I got up and walked on the treadmill for 2 minutes).
This gave me insight into the need to vary the intensity and mode of each study session, depending on my energy levels and what I have planned for the rest of the day. Sometimes it’s good to go into turbocharge mode, but not always.
Not every study/work session has to be hardcore. Work sessions that leave you feeling completely drained by the end can be counterproductive. As Professor BJ Fogg says, “Tiny is mighty”.
Firstly, tiny study sessions are less scary for your brain. Five minutes of speech practice and flashcard practice feels easy. You think, “I can do 5 minutes!”.
In contrast, one hour of study feels scary for your brain, which means you’re more likely to procrastinate.
When you go tiny, it’s also easier to give your full focus to the task at hand. Here’s the thing about focus: focusing your mind takes a lot of your brainpower. And you have a limited supply of brainpower!
As you sit there and study, your brainpower gets depleted. But research shows one way to boost your attentional resources (i.e. your brainpower) is by taking regular breaks. If you study in short focused bursts and then take a break, you can stay refreshed and ensure your study sessions are effective.
But most importantly, tiny study sessions help to create momentum, and they leave you feeling good!
I tend to push myself to the point of exhaustion when I practise my talks. But I can see now that this makes it hard for me to want to practise in the future.
By dedicating just 5–10 minutes to the task and enjoying it, I’m more likely to do another 5 minutes (or more) of practice tomorrow. Doing five minutes of practice every day is infinitely better than doing no practice or cramming a long practice session in the day before.
You’re not going to go from good to great in one tiny study session. But you can make meaningful progress and create the momentum you need to keep going.
So, don’t turn your nose up at five minutes of flashcard practice or 10 minutes of doing a practice test. If done with focus and intention, that’s a solid study session that can set you on the path to success.
Image credit:
Toddler (featured in image 2): “Skeptical” by quinn.anya is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
Rat: “Fancy rat blaze” by AlexK100 is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
