A distraction is something that pulls us away from doing the thing we want to be doing.
A distraction doesn't exist unless we have something to be distracted from.
Do you know what you should be doing at this moment?
Throughout your day?
Do you plan it ahead of time?
Most of us don’t.
If we don't know what we’re supposed to be doing, we can't know when we're distracted.
Plan your time—even your downtime.
Then, when distraction tempts you, you can ask specific questions: why don’t I want to do this? What emotion am I feeling right now?
We can use the 10-minute rule: if we still want to indulge our distraction in 10 minutes, we will. But for 10 more minutes we’ll focus on what we need to.
But it all starts with knowing what we are being distracted from.
