Yesterday, when I was doing some focused work, after some time, I felt so agitated and restless that I desperately wanted an escape — check the news, open LinkedIn, do anything.
When the task is hard or tedious, this ‘escape impulse’ comes to me quite early.
And this happens to all of us. We assume that external distractions are the problem, but half of our distractions come from inside us.
How do you handle this?
If you give in to the distraction, say by opening Instagram, you will get sucked into a rabbit hole and half an hour may go by even before you realize it.
Then should you just force yourself to focus? That’s also a bad idea — when the mind is saturated, our brain is depleted of dopamine and serotonin, which are required for focus. So brute force won’t work.
The best option is to take a few deep breaths, take a break from work, and allow your mind to calm down. Typically, after a few minutes, I automatically feel ready to start work again. You are allowing your agitation to melt away, just as you might do in vipassana meditation.
So just let your mind be, and wait. Not everything has to be war.
PS: I typically take 5 min break after 25 min of focus, but after a few focus sprints, you get restless despite that.
– Rajan