Welcome to issue No. 065 of the Lever

Back in 2017 I completed a 21-day digital fast.

No social media, extremely limited emails, even the books I read were paperback.

I did this because I was getting easily distracted. When it was time to write, I would "research" instead.

Deadlines would creep up and I wouldn't ship the quality I wanted because I hadn't spent enough time doing the work.

This is what I did to change it.

One second...

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Freelance writing on the side means you must produce more work in less time.

You have deadlines to meet, obligations to your day job, and the rest of your life to balance in between.

So when its time to write, you need to WRITE.

The best way to maximize your output when you write is by focusing completely on the task at hand.

Here are a few lessons learned from my digital fast that may help:

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Build Your Walls

Focus requires solitude.

It takes very little to break your concentration when you are in a creative mindset, so the best thing to do is build a moat for your attention.

If you have an office, simply close the door. In a shared environment you can put in earplugs, or put on noise cancelling headphones.

Either will send a powerful Do Not Disturb message.

Working from home can be trickier and will likely require a conversation with your family about boundaries.

Maya Angelou famously worked from hotel rooms:

"I have kept a hotel room in every town I’ve ever lived in. I rent a hotel room for a few months, leave my home at six, and try to be at work by six-thirty."

Create a quiet place to fuel your focus.

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Eliminate Distractions

Your walls block distractions from the outside. Next you must deal from distractions on the inside.

Device notifications should be the first thing to go.

Your phone, your computer, your smart watch - every beep or flashing light pulls you away from the task at hand. The promise of solving some perceived urgency, offering instant gratification.

You must differentiate between what is Urgent and what is Important.

Your work is important. That email is probably not.

Taking this a step further, consider removing time-wasting apps from your phone entirely. It doesn’t mean that you can’t check social media. It just means that you empower yourself to do so on your own terms.

You won’t miss as much as you think, and you’ll gain so much more.

Finally, you can go full analogue.

Enter the room with nothing but a pad and a pen. Work entirely from paper, then transfer to digital later as required.

Handwriting is proven to tap the creative side of your brain, and without any outside distractions you'll have nothing to do but write.

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Prime the Pump

Before starting the work I stop a moment, straighten up, take a deep breath, and set my intention towards that task.

You can't really multi-task. You just quickly switch between two different tasks. Each with different goals and rules.

There is a time penalty for both.

Running a mental Task Switching Sequence will help you get on task and stay there longer.

I've written about this is depth here: https://twitter.com/SeanPHogue/status/1621464585680175109​

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Prioritize and Execute

What is the most important thing that you need to be doing right now?

Answer that, then do it.

Things pop up during the day that seem important.

So you drop everything and focus on it.

But jumping from one task to the next just leaves you with nothing but a bunch of unfinished tasks.

You need to develop a relentless focus on finishing.

​https://twitter.com/SeanPHogue/status/1537396333618806788​

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Stay Focused

These tactics are easy to implement and, more than that, free you to do your best work.

Identify what you want to accomplish, keep coming back to those tasks consistently, and perform them with focus. This is the simple formula for great results.

Apply undistracted attention to a task and you will achieve better results in less time.

For writers trying to make it while still working 9-5 this is the greatest skill you can develop.

And don't hesitate to do a digital fast. It can change your life.

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P.S.

A smart system for prioritizing, focusing, and managing your time is a force multiplier.

It’s a key to living well, across all of the big-5 areas of time.

If you really want to get clear on your priorities and build a strong moat around your attention, grab a copy of my time management book - Peaceful Productivity.

It’s a complete system that starts at philosophy then gets right into specific tactics.

It will change how you think about time.

​https://seanphogue.ck.page/products/peaceful-productivity​

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