Feeling busy and distracted Its not your fault

Feeling busy and distracted Its notlage your faultFeeling busy and distracted Its not your faultYouve got a new email from your boss, plus a dozen old ones that totenstill require a response Your friend posted photos from her visit to a coffee plantation in Costa Rica Whats the stock market doing today?All illustrations by Jake Knapp from Make Time.Everyone is saying a bear market is coming, but you cant really predict those things Theres a new iPhone out, and you heard you can unlock it with your mind. You just got a notification The deputy secretary of some government agency is resigning You have time for a few minutes of Fortnite, dont you? Today you have a lot of meetings. What will you do about dinner? You should keep moving, be productive, and do the right thing.You read that the fruchtwein successful people arent on Facebook and have something called grit. That sounds good. You need grit.Follow Ladders on FlipboardFollow Ladders magazines on Flipboard covering Happiness, Produ ctivity, Job Satisfaction, Neuroscience, and moreWe live in a distracting world, and its not getting any better. New information crashes toward us at every moment. Technology companies work tirelessly to create products that bring convenience and delight to our days. The incentive structure hasnt changed usage creates data, data sells ads, ubiquity creates demand, demand sells devices.Sure, Google hasDigital Wellbeingand Apple hasScreen Time, and both are good things. But the bottom line is that everyone involved- from the hardware makers to the OS designers to the app creators- benefit when we use these technologies more, not less.Its natural to think we need more discipline, willpower, energy, stamina, focus, or grit to resist these distractions. More something, for sure.But for fruchtwein people,I dont think willpower is the right approach. New psychology research is showing thatold ideas about willpower and self-control werent quite right. Just ask a gambling addict or a smoker. Its possible that we cant build willpower and we cant summon self-control, after all. Theyre myths. What often looks like strength of resolve is really the result of an environment or mindset that makes theright decisionstheeasy decisions.But if self-control is a function of circumstances, how can you change those circumstances? If willpower is a myth, how can you create an environment for good decisions that dont require willpower? It starts with defaults.If youre busy and distracted, its not yourfaultEvery day, dozens of defaults - from preinstalled apps to expectations of instant response, to handy notifications, to cultural agreements on whats considered normal - shape how we spend our time. Our willing acceptance of distracting apps and our culture of constant busyness show just how normal these things have become.Defaults seem inevitable after the fact, but they werent assembled according to a grand plan. Modern life is not a utopia designed by some genius - its just a coll ection of defaults that have stuck over the years.So if you constantly feel busy and distracted, its not your fault. But thereis something you can do about itYou can change the defaults of distraction and busyness by reconfiguring your technology.Lets get real If you want to reclaim control of your time, its your responsibility. No digital wellbeing feature or anti-technology manifesto is going to undo these defaults. And nobody cares more about your time than you do. Dont get me wrong Im glad that Google, Apple, and Facebook are designing tools to help us form healthier relationships with their products. Im happy that writers likeTristan HarrisandAdam Alterare pulling back the curtains on the tech industry and pushing these companies to do better.But you cant wait for tech companies to give you back your time. Its on you.Since youre reading this story, you probably feel like you should get better about distraction and focus. You probably recognize the sensation that rises after a m indless Instagram session or a where-did-the-day-go evening reflection. Maybe it feels like regret. Maybe it feels like fire. But if you feel it, harness that energy.Dont wait. Make the changes now.How to create barriers to distractionWhat Im about to suggest is simple but not easy. It requires a burst of effort, but once you reconfigure your devices and apps, you dont have to constantly resist the distractions. You wont feel that nagging pull to do a quick Twitter check,because you cant. You wont wonder whether you have any new emails,because you cant find out. The key is creating barriers to distraction.Here are three things you can try now- three tactics that take willpower and self-control out of the equation.1. Remove distracting apps (from yourphone)This is the simplest, fruchtwein effective way to reclaim time and attention from your smartphone. In contrast to hacks like selectively disabling notifications, rearranging your home screen, customizing sounds and vibrations, or p utting your phone into Airplane or Do Not Disturb mode, removing apps gets to the core of the problem.It cuts off distraction where it starts. And it makes the hacks obsolete You wont have to worry about notifications or airplane mode or hiding your distracting appsif theyre not installed in the first place.If removing apps is so effective and so simple, why dont more people do it? Maybe we fear the anticipated pain of making hard choices, so we look for shortcuts that feel productive (like an elaborate form of procrastination). Maybe we worry about removing a certain app because we use it for work, or because well fall out of touch with friends, or because everyone else is using it. But we forget that defaults feel more permanent than they really are that the app store is still just one tap away and friction-free as ever and thatwe can still use Twitter and check email and read the news, but we can do it on our terms.Besides, Im not proposing monastic vows of tech abstinence- just an experiment with a distraction-free phone.After removing these apps, you might find that your feelings of FOMO are replaced with new feelings of calm and control over your time. You might realize that seeing your friends photos on Facebook is not the same as keeping in touch with them. And you might discover that beinglessresponsive actually makes you amorevaluable colleague, because you can spend more time on the work that matters to your team.2. Log out and change passwords (on your computer)Removing Infinity Pool apps from your smartphone is a big step toward reclaiming your time and attention. But you might find that the empty address bar of your computers web browser is just as hard to resist. Its right there every time you wake your computer a magical portal to the infinite possibilities of the Internet.WhoaHow can we make time for what matters when the alternative is infinite entertainment and education? Once again, the key is creating barriers to distraction but on the com puter, its not quite as easy as deleting a few apps.Heres what works for meFirst, I changed my passwords for Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn (my top distractions on the computer).I chose new passwords that were random and impossible to remember. For example, m6a$78Hg. (Dont get excited thats not really one of my passwords.)I put those passwords in a password manager app. I like1Password, but there are others.I logged out of each and every Infinity Pool website.I removed all bookmarks and shortcuts to these sites from my browser.These simple tweaks create speed bumps on the road to mindlessly checking one of these Infinity Pools. Lets say I semi-unconsciously decide to check Twitter. (This happens multiple times a day ) Because I no longer have a link in my bookmark bar, I have to type in twitter.com. But when I hit return and the login screen appears instead of the feed, Im reminded to pause and consider what Im doing Am I checking Twitter on purpose, or by default? Do I have someth ing to do- like see if anyone posted a question aboutmy book- or am I just looking for a break?The answers to these questions are not always clear, and I dont always make the right decisions. (Right being the decisions I know I want myself to make. Im not talking about some allgemein gltig judgment of whats right and wrong here.When Im finished using one of these sites, I log out again, resetting the barriers to distraction. Ill admit That final log-out does require a small amount of ongoing discipline. But this habit is easier to maintain than most, because I can harness the feelings of guilt and annoyance that typically accompany the end of a session with one of these apps. It goes something like thisHmm, do I really want to look at Twitter? Yeah, okay, theres something I need to do. (30 minutes later.) Ugh, I spent half an hour on Twitter I gotta do something else. I should log out so this doesnt happen again. ClickThe friction introduced by having to stop, consider, grab the pas sword, copy, paste, and sign in does me good. It forces me to make a decision about how Im spending my time, instead of mindlessly reacting to defaults.3. Get proactive with yourtimeThis defensive perspective- creating barriers and habits to defeat distraction- is essential for reclaiming time and attention, but an emphasis on defense can feel like drudgery. Its like eating healthfully or saving money both are necessary but can feel like chores (or worse, like deprivation) unless balanced by an awareness ofwhy were adopting those behaviors.Similarly, when it comes to how we spend our time, we need more than defense - we need to think proactively about what were making timefor.The best way Ive found to maintain a proactive mindset is with the daily practice of choosing a Highlight.Try asking yourself the questionWhen I look back on my day, what do I want the highlight to be?Maybe its an accomplishment at work. Maybe its a project youve been meaning to do at home. Or maybe its an act ivity that brings you joy - a long walk, a board game, or cooking a meal from scratch.Thinking about what youre making time for can create the motivation to set new habits into motion. And when your habits fall apart and things dont go as planned, the daily presence of your Highlight becomes a beacon, reminding you of the decisions you made and the plans you set - and giving you a boost to get back on track.A daily Highlight can also be the saving grace of an otherwise blah day. When youve chosen a Highlight, and planned your day to make time for it, you can mark a win even if the rest of the day kind of sucks.Thats one of the reasons I love to work on my Highlight first thing in the morning When I make time for something important right after waking up, the rest of the day is gravy. A traffic jam, a delayed train, a meeting that runs late, an outdoor workout thats rained out - these things are a drag, for sure, butwhen Ive already made time for my Highlight, I can grab a slice o f satisfaction from even the most unsatisfactory of days.The power of a Highlight to rescue a day is critical to the attitude of self-forgiveness that I talked about at the beginning of this story. See, youll never be perfectly free of distraction. Your days will never be perfectly planned. And while its not your fault that you live in a world of endless busyness and distraction, youcando something about it. Youcanadjust the defaults of this world.Youcancreate an environment that supports and enables the kinds of decisions you want to make about your time.If youre intentional about your decisions, yet forgiving when things dont go according to plan, you can change your life. You have to start sometime. Why not today?This article first appeared on Make Time.You might also enjoyNew neuroscience reveals 4 rituals that will make you happyStrangers know your social class in the first seven words you say, study finds10 lessons from Benjamin Franklins daily schedule that will double your p roductivityThe worst mistakes you can make in an interview, according to 12 CEOs10 habits of mentally strong people