I'm not big on "tip" articles with titles like 5 Tips to Improve Your Lacrosse Swing or Top 10 Ways to Pretend You're Not a Ghost, but I want to share a couple of simple moves I made recently that really helped to get some of the noise in my life under control.
I'm not speaking literally about audio noise; although, sometimes there's too much of that, too. I refer to a nasty little dude named Distraction who pokes you in the metaphorical ribs while you're trying to focus on things that actually matter. He says to you innocently, "Pay attention to me! I'm totally just as important as the project you're working on."
But he's not. He's a dumb email you got CC-ed on. He's an article about Brazilian hyper-modern marina architecture.
So, despite mixed reactions from Congress, I declared war on Distraction. And he's going down.
Operation STFU
Be still my buzzing iPhone
I get a lot of email and very little of it is worth reading immediately. Nor does it come in neat bundles at convenient stopping points during a project. Email is a steady stream of implied urgency, like the toothless rambling of a senile old lady. You know that 90% of what she says isn't worth hearing, but you also have to keep an ear open in case she tries to make an omelette with the newspaper.A problem with this steady stream was that I got notified on my phone every time a new message came in. Buzz.. buzz..... buzz. So finally, after I noticed patterns in the noise, I created some email filters.
I use Gmail for most of my email accounts (I have four active email addresses), so it was very easy to create some filters based on whence or from whom the emails come. For example, much of my incoming email is from Adobe, but it's never urgent. So now, with a filter in place, those emails skip the inbox and are "shelved" under the Adobe label. I can still check new emails from Adobe, but I do it on my own terms. This simple trick can be replicated in most email applications.
Info about filters and labels in Gmail
Shoot the messenger
For the record, I love Digsby. If you work on a PC, you will not find a better IM client (don't worry Mac kids, they're workin' on it). But they added some "convenient features" which, at first, seem like they would actually reduce distractions. For example, Digsby, the generous fellow that he is, can check your Facebook or Twitter every five seconds and alert you instantly if someone has sent you a message or done anything that you might give a crap about. Convenient, right?Wrong! I set this up for a while, and every few minutes my eyes would snap over to the corner of the screen. "Oh! Someone ate a White Castle slider with ranch on it?! I'd better go check this out." Close current window. Open failure browser. Suck at life.
Instant notifications, while they seem convenient and useful, are counterintuitively designed to keep your attention away from anything important. Turn them off and check (or avoid) Facebook/Twitter/email on your own schedule.
Sit near the road less traveled
I also made a more literal move to reduce daily noise as well. My workstation at Real Art was located near the South staircase, so as to ease travel to and fro the photography studio. An unexpected side effect of this: people go up and down those stairs all the time! The bastard Distraction saw for himself great opportunity within this situation.So after about 6 months, I made my move. Geographically. I did some quasi-scientific research, found the least traveled area of the room, and set up shop there. I've only been in the new spot for a few days, but already I feel so much more calm and focused.
Death before defeat
There's still plenty of noise. I may never get rid of it all, but I'll keep trying to find ways to reduce it, and to stop myself from creating more.Let me know if you've discovered any good noise-cancellers lately.
