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Have you ever watched horse racing? And seen horses wearing BLINKERS?
They are those semi-circular cups that fit on the side of horses’ eyes.
Why do they need them?
Horses have a wide peripheral vision and horse trainers know that in order for their horse to run their best race, they have to maximise their focus.
And for their horse to focus, the trainer has to be able to remove as many of the distractions around their horse as possible.
We need blinkers too if we want to run our best race every day.
We can get better at our focus by practising IGNORING distractions!
Our ability to focus on something isn’t just because of our attention on that thing, but also because of our ability to block out everything else!
We have to learn the professional skill of ignoring.
Yes – we actually need to practise ignoring things.
✅ Ignoring distractions when we’re doing our deep work
✅ Emails; social media; messages; news etc.
✅ Ignoring temptations
✅ Ignoring our negative self-talk
✅ Ignoring other people’s comments that aren’t helpful
✅ Ignoring other opportunities/work/goals that could dilute our time spent on the one we’re currently working on
A research study at Jon Hopkins University actually found that if we are intentional about the things we want to ignore before we start working on our goal, our speed at achieving our goal increases.
So use this time to decide on what, when and how you will ignore distractions in order to achieve your goal.
TAKE ACTION:
- What are some of the distractions that are getting in the way of achieving your current goal/habit?
- How can you practice ignoring those distractions? Think about when and how you will ignore them?
- COACHING: If you would like to know more about overcoming distractions for peak productivity, then book a free consultation with me here.
