The Mindset Mentor - The 4 Secrets to Focusing

Episode Date: August 28, 2019

Episode 638 - We live in the most distracted time in human history, therefore being able to focus is a skill that will set you apart from the rest. In this episode, I will give you my 4 secrets to getting great at focusing! Follow me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/robdialjr/ Want to learn more about Mindset Mentor+? For nearly nine years, the Mindset Mentor Podcast has guided you through life's ups and downs. Now, you can dive even deeper with Mindset Mentor Plus. Turn every podcast lesson into real-world results with detailed worksheets, journaling prompts, and a supportive community of like-minded people. Enjoy monthly live Q&A sessions with me, and all this for less than a dollar a day. If you’re committed to real, lasting change, this is for you.Join here 👉 www.mindsetmentor.com My first book that I’ve ever written is now available. It’s called LEVEL UP and It’s a step-by-step guide to go from where you are now, to where you want to be as fast as possible.📚If you want to order yours today, you can just head over to robdial.com/bookHere are some useful links for you… If you want access to a multitude of life advice, self development tips, and exclusive content daily that will help you improve your life, then you can follow me around the web at these links here:Instagram TikTokFacebookYoutube

Welcome to the Mindset and Motivation Podcast, one of the top motivational podcasts in the world. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we come out with a short, to the point, no BS episode to help make massive changes in your mind and transform you from who you are now to who you want to be. My name is Rob Dial, and the podcast starts now. Welcome to today's episode. If you have not yet done so, hit that subscribe button so that you never miss another episode. And last but not least, like I said, I gave you the announcement

last time, the new podcast name, this podcast name will be switching over from the Mindset and Motivation podcast to the Mindset Mentor. So this podcast name is going to be switching soon. I just want to tell you a few episodes ahead of time so that you can make a mental note so that everybody can hear it. The podcast name is going to be changing to The Mindset Mentor with Rob Dial. So make sure that you write it down, make sure that you save it, make sure that you know, and just take a mental note of it. But today we're going to be talking about the four steps to focus better. So let's go ahead and dive in. The first thing I want to talk about out of the

four keys that I want to give you on how to focus. Number one is I want to talk about your phone. We live in the most distracted era that humans have ever lived since the beginning of time and part of the reason why, if not the main reason why, is because of our phones. So the first tip I'll give you of how to focus more is to think about how you're distracted. One of the things I like to do as soon as I wake up is turn my alarm off on my phone and then go as long as I possibly can before I look at my phone again. I always like to say there's Rob before the phone during the day and then there's Rob after the phone during the day. So the first thing I want you to think about in the morning,

how soon do you look at your phone? Are you looking at your phone as soon as you wake up in the morning? Because if you are, you're immediately going and having your brain go into reaction mode. What you would prefer is that your brain goes into proactive mode. So you have reaction and you can go into reactive mode or you have proactive mode. Which one would you prefer to be in? Well, when you wake up and you immediately go to emails, you immediately go to Instagram, Facebook, and you're doing that while you're on your phone in your bed, you're going directly towards reactive. When you wake up, you brush your teeth, you shower, you meditate, you drink your coffee, you read, you journal, you're going into proactive mode. So you're allowing yourself to grow before

you start getting distracted. So the first thing is ask yourself, how long do I go from the second I wake up until I look at my phone? And then ask yourself, how much do I look at my phone throughout the day? So if we're talking about how to stay focused, remove as many distractions as possible. That's the first key. And the phone is usually the biggest distraction. How many times a day do you look at your phone? You know, if you have your phone right next to you when you're at work, when you're on your, you know, at your desk and you see every notification that pops up, well, you're going

to be distracted all day long. You're going to be working and then bling, your phone goes off. And now you have to go and get back. Even if you don't look at your phone, you just look down real quick, see what the notification was. And then you go back to working. That's still a distraction. So the first thing is if you want to get really focused, ask yourself, how often do I look at my phone? And do I look at my phone first thing in the morning when I wake up? The second thing to do when we're diving into this topic a little bit deeper besides just the phone is remove the rest of your distractions. If you're trying to focus, what else are you distracted by

besides just your phone? Do you have your computer that's constantly up? When you're working on your computer, every time you get an email, does a notification come by and tell you that you get an email? Well, there's studies that have been done that found out that if you're in intense work, if you're like in the zone, you're doing the, you're like at a hundred percent and just a notification steals your thoughts away from it for one, two, three seconds, maybe it could take 15 to 20 minutes to get back to that focus that you were at before. So then what I want to say to you is, can you remove all of the notifications so that you don't get any? If you try to send me a text message on my phone, I won't see it until I look at my phone.

The only time that my phone will go from a black screen to lit up without me doing it is if I get a phone call. So does your phone go off every time you get an Instagram? Does it go off every time you get, you know, one of your favorite people put something up on YouTube? Does it go off every single time that somebody sends you a message on Facebook or a text message or an email? If you can, remove all of the notifications. Every app that you have, do not allow it to give you any sort of notifications. every app that you have, do not allow it to give you any sort of notifications. And what you'll notice is you're able to be more focused because of the fact that there's less distractions pulling your focus away. And next thing you can think about besides just the technology as far as distractions go are people. If you work in an office, how can you remove those

distractions? If you have your own office, you know, a room, can you shut the door when you want to get too intense focus? If you're allowed to, can you put headphones in? There's been studies that have found that people are less likely to walk up to you and talk to you if you have headphones in. So think about your environment besides just the phone, the computer. Think about the environment, the people around you, the doors that are open, the headphones that can go in. Those are other ways to remove distraction. Third thing to help you focus is to stop multitasking. What they found is this, is that there's actually no such thing as

multitasking. You're just switching from one task to another. So if you think you're a great multitasker, there's actual studies that have been found that multitasking makes you dumber, which means that you're actually getting less done, you're less productive, and you're doing worse work if you're trying to actually multitask throughout the day. And what scientists have actually found is that when you switch from one task to another, you get a cognitive switching penalty. So when you start, when you're in intense focus in one and you switch to another one, it takes you time to ramp back up. So if you're ramping up on this one and then you decide to switch to this one, it takes time to ramp back up. And if you switch back to this one, then it takes time to ramp back up. So multitasking

is actually not even real. So if you consider yourself a multitasker, get rid of it. Stop doing it. Find one thing that you can do for an extended amount of time. Another way of getting better at single tasking is something called the Pomodoro Technique. I have another episode that you can look at about the Pomodoro Technique, explaining it in depth. But the thing that you need to know about it is this. It's basically one task, one single task, and you put a timer on your phone, you put a timer on your computer, whatever it is, you listen to a 25-minute drowning out song in YouTube in the background, and what you do is you do one single task for 25 minutes, and then you get a five-minute break, and then you go back to 25 minutes, and you do this

four rounds total, and they found that your productivity is four times better if you use the Pomodoro technique than any other technique that people are known for. And the reason why is because 25 minutes is about the attention span of a human to be really, really intensely focused. And then your mind will start to wander. Most people, it's like two to three minutes nowadays and in this day and age, but you're trying to extend your focus as long as you can. So look up the Pomodoro technique if you want to learn more about that. And the last thing I'll tell you is this. If you want to get really highly focused, start using a notepad, a pen and paper, and keep it everywhere with you. Not your phone,

but a pen and paper and use it. And the reason why is because of the fact that your brain has so many things that are just filtering through it all of the time. There's all of these things that should literally just like a bunch of things bouncing off of the walls inside of the brain that you have. But when you can take those things and write them down, pen and paper, your brain is able to release it. And the reason why it's better for pen and paper instead of actually typing it is because your brain is physically able to see it in the world. It's not on a screen. It's in the world and your brain can go, okay, I can release this. So anytime that you're working, you're sitting there and you're, you're, you're single tasking,

you're trying to work on something, but an idea pops into your head, write it down with a notebook, let it go, and then go back to whatever it is that you were doing. That's the easiest way to get rid of it. Cause normally what we do is we're working on something. We go, Oh my God, I forgot to send that email to Jane. And then we go and send the email to Jane and we're like, Oh damn, what was I doing before? And we forget about what we were doing. So if you're working and you have that idea of, I need to send an email to Jane, you take your notebook. It should be just on your desk. If you're working or in your back pocket, if you're, you know, walking down the street, whatever it is, you have that idea of I need to send an email to Jane, you take your notebook. It should be just on your desk if you're working or in your back pocket if you're walking down the street, whatever it is, you have it with you at all times. You write it down so you don't forget.

And then you go back to what you were doing before. So those are the four techniques to help you be less distracted, to focus more so that you can get more out of every day. So number one, think about your phone. Try to stay away from it as much as you possibly can throughout the day, especially in the morning. The second thing, remove as many distractions as you possibly can. The third thing, stop multitasking. There's no such thing as multitasking. You're just single taskingly switching back and forth and you're giving yourself a penalty every single time as you do it. And the last thing, have a notepad with you so that anytime an idea pops in, you just write it down. So that's what I got for you for this episode.

If you like this episode, please share with someone that you know and love. And I'm gonna leave it the same way I leave you every single episode. Make it your mission to make someone else's day better. I appreciate you and hope that you have an amazing day. On holiday, there's nothing like doing nothing. As an Expedia member, you can save up to 30% when you add a hotel to your flight. So you can go out there with great ambition

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