How To Focus Without Multi-Tasking & Procrastinating

You get home; it's almost 8 p.m. You're tired, you want to get to bed, but you still have a lot of work to finish tonight. How do you LOCK IT IN and get it done?

You know this: Put down your phone and use a trusty To Do List. Then, begin.

Do You Believe in Multi-Tasking?

If it's that simple, then why don't we just sit our booties down and get the work done? Let me ask you a question that I asked my leadership mastermind students last week (we were talking about multitasking), "Do you believe you can do multiple things at the same time?"

We watched this interesting video together that showed the neurology (brain activity) behind what we think is doing many things at the same time. Turns out, the brain can only really do one thing at a time. What feels like doing several things simultaneously is actually the brain switching from one task to another task. Every time you do something different, the brain is switching back and forth between tasks, never actually doing multiple things at the same time.

Now, the exception is if the brain is using different cognitive resources. That is, if the brain is using two different mental processes, then it is possible to do two things at the same time, such as reading and listening to music, or driving and talking.

But the big point is: Multitasking is a myth. We cannot humanly do 2, 3, 4, 5 things at the same time. You can only focus on one thing at a time. Focus is the topic that we dedicated last week's leadership mastermind to studying, which is a chapter in this book we're going through together this school year called the 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader.

Divided focus will always work against you.

In the early 1900s, there was a man named Clyde Beatty who became famous for taming circus lions for performances. The way he tamed these wild animals was by using the four legs of a chair to divide their focus. The lion would try to look at all four legs at the same time, which paralyzed the lion. In the same way, when we try to do too many things at the same time, we can't focus and get nothing done.

Clyde Beatty (1903-1965)

To improve focus, we have to understand how the human brain actually works. We cannot do more than one thing well at the same time. When we switch from one task to another, we use mental energy. Like a pie chart, there's only a finite amount of mental energy that you have available at the end of a long school day. It becomes critical to make good choices for how to spend that limited amount of mental energy before your brain just gets too exhausted and can't function correctly anymore, and you just have to call it quits and go to bed.

Procrastination: A Protective Mechanism

Another obvious challenge that stands in the way of us sitting down and getting our work done is procrastination. Every single student in my mastermind raised their hand when I asked, "Who struggles with procrastination?"

What is the deal with procrastination? Why do we put off what we know we should do? Did you know that procrastination does not necessarily mean that you are lazy? We watched another fun video together that contains some new and encouraging information about why we procrastinate.

Procrastination is actually your body's way of protecting you from feeling negative emotions when it comes time to sit down and do the work. So many times when it's time to put the phone down, close the computer tabs, find an undistracted place to sit to study, you open up your homework and all these feelings of negative emotions can overtake you -- feelings of overwhelm when you need to start writing the paper.

I always felt feelings of incompetency and inadequacy and just plain dumb when I had to do my Calculus  homework. (Let's keep it real--I didn't take Calculus in high school; I took it in college. What I meant was, my Geometry and Algebra 2 homework.) Experiencing negative emotions makes us want to stop (or not start) our work because we don't like to face our limitations. We don't like to face our shortcomings and our weaknesses.

Something that my students found interesting about procrastination is the fact that we don't always put things off because we don't care enough about our grades or about our classes. We sometimes procrastinate because we care too much.

Those of you who are on the perfectionist side maybe put off the work because you're afraid to get started. If you can't finish, you're afraid to get started. If you don't do a good job, you're afraid to get started. If you don't have everything you need to know in order to do it well, whether or not you care too little or you care too much about the work, you still have to get it done.

The way we can overcome procrastination is by shifting your expectations. Expect to feel uncomfortable when it's time to sit down and study; don't expect it to feel good. Expect resistance, expect temptation toward distraction, and then simply decide that you are going to push through that temptation instead of giving in to it.

Practical Strategies for Effective Work

So, use a strategy to work through the discomfort to get your work done. Make it less threatening, less intimidating, less overwhelming.

To-Do Lists

I'm not going to spend a lot of time here because I'm pretty sure y'all know how to create a to-do list. All you do is write down all the things that you need to accomplish tonight, and then you simply pick the top three that must get done. Then of those three, you choose the one that you're going to commit to doing for 25 minutes. You set your timer, do the work for 25 minutes, and then you take a five minute stretch break.

The Benefits of Writing Tasks Down

"I don't need to write it down on a piece of paper. I'm just gonna keep a mental list in my head of what I need to do tonight."

If you just had that thought, let me encourage you to try writing it down on a piece of paper. Because if you write down everything you have to do, it takes that burden out of your body and puts it onto a piece of paper. That actually has been proven to reduce anxiety and to clear your mind so that you can do a better job on the work.

One more thing: you need to check off the tasks that you have completed once you accomplish them. That also releases dopamine in the brain and makes you feel a sense of satisfaction and a sense of reward. And that actually motivates you to keep doing the work so that you can feel more of that satisfaction.

Mastering Mind & Body for Productivity

That's how you get it done: one task at a time. These are not new ideas, right? These are time-tested, classic ideas for productivity. The leadership principle here is simply to master your mind and to master your body -- to get yourself to sit down and do what you need to do, to not put things off, not believe that you can do multiple things at once when you actually can't, and to simply decide that you are going to use the strategies that you now know.

The Pomodoro Method Explained

The Pomodoro Method was invented by a guy named Francesco Cirillo in the sixties, and pomodoro actually means tomato in Italian. He just simply used a kitchen timer in the shape of a tomato to force himself to get his work done in small manageable blocks of time.

Francesco Cirillo and his book The Pomodoro Technique

Research and studies have shown that the human attention span at its optimal is 25 minutes before you should take a break. So you set your timer (preferably not your phone because your phone can easily become a black hole of distraction) for 25 minutes, and you sit and work for 25 straight minutes. You lock it in for 25 minutes, and then you get to take a 5-minute brain break--not necessarily to watch a YouTube video or to check email or to text a friend because those are easily black holes that can suck you in and become distractions.

Do 4 rounds of 25-minute blocks, which is 100 minutes of work. And in between those blocks, you take 5-minute breaks. At the end of 4 rounds or 100 minutes, you take a longer 30 minute break. Again, be careful how you use those 30 minutes. If you try it, you will probably realize that you can get the majority of your work done in 100 minutes--if you're focused, if you're undistracted, if you're intentional about locking it in and getting it done.

Focusing on God

We cannot talk about focus without talking about: how do you focus more (mot on school, work, not on homework, not in classes) on God? My students have asked me this question, and I actually did a video on this in my ask me anything playlist called 'How Do I Stay Connected to God at School?' But how do you focus on God?

Colossians 3:2 says, "Set your mind on things above, not on earthly things." And Hebrews 12:2 says to "Fix your eyes on Jesus." But how do we do that? There are two ways that are, again, not new. They are obvious; we just need to do them.

PUT IN THE EFFORT

First, we must put in the effort. The effort is doing the work of the classic spiritual disciplines. We pray, read the Bible, read a devotional book., go to church, take notes while listening to the sermon, attend youth group, make some Christian friends and hang out with them, join the Christian Club at school, etc. These are all ways to put in the effort to focus on God.

CHANGE YOUR ENVIRONMENT

In addition to effort, we must change our environment. "Environment is the invisible hand that shapes human behavior." That is a quote by James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, a book I love and use with my leadership students. Environment is putting yourself in a place where you're surrounded by people who are focused on God. Finding a place where your desired behavior is the normal behavior is the easiest way to change your behavior. This is why gyms are an effective environment for people who want to be in shape.

CONCLUSION

There is no leader who has not had to intentionally LEARN how to be more productive, how to get things done, how to optimize their bodies to produce as much energy as possible to get everything done. If you feel like you're still new to this and you still look at every passing squirrel, that's ok! We live in an age of distraction, and it just means that we have to work a little harder to learn these leadership skills in order to fulfill the plan that God has for each day of our lives. Let that be our motivation. We are here to learn how to master our mind, to master our time, and to master our energy so that we can fulfill the tasks that God wants us to fulfill each and every day--for His glory and for your good.

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Brenda Jung is a Christian Leadership Mentor for Students and Leadership Instructors. She loves helping students find and fulfill their God-given mission in life by developing their personal leadership qualities, values, and skills before graduating from high school.