Feed your concentration

Learn how to feed your concentration to maximise your time, energy and output

Some people claim there is no such thing as multitasking and others say it is, in fact, unproductive. Certainly, we have different ways of working and there is more than one way to achieve a result. And a great way to get results is to pinpoint how to feed your concentration.

I start lots of things, work on them concurrently and appear to work in chaos, some random (dis)order that only makes sense to me. The most notable characteristic of how I work is jumping from one activity to another as my brain sparks with ideas.

Right now, for example, I’m writing two blogs, hopping between one and the other as ideas come to me. (I’m also doing a jigsaw, but I’ll explain that later on).

Productive? It doesn’t seem it should be, but it is. How? Because I know how my brain works, and I work with, not against it.

It might look like chaos to an outsider, but I thrive on it. To a point.

The proactive juggling keeps my brain busy, switching from one thing to another sparks my interest and that in turn creates momentum and positive pressure that motivates me.

My brain is a busy place. And it gets distracted. I get bored easily and crave new or different things to occupy me, so in order to get things done, I entertain and feed my brain. I work in chunks of time, it might be an hour, it might be two minutes, and I use a contrasting activity as a break, a time to refresh my concentration.

I call these contrasting activities ‘sorbet tasks.’

Like a sorbet course in a meal, the ‘sorbet task’ cleanses my brain of what I was doing and sets it up refreshed and ready to do the next thing.

A transition task might be five minutes spent reading, five minutes checking email or 10 minutes having a cuppa or putting the washing out. Whatever it is doesn’t really matter, as long as you change focus – and put your active/work brain on pause to allow your other thoughts to develop and appear. It's about taking time to think.

My personal favourite sorbet task is tidying. Probably as an antidote to the chaos and pressure I generate to get my brain fired up, clearing things away for five minutes and creating order soothes my brain and helps me switch gears.

In addition, I use it as a way to catalogue what I’ve done and what there is to do. If there’s nothing left to tidy, I do a bit of a digital jigsaw. Tidying is taking control, smoothing rough edges and allowing my brain muscles to stretch.

But some people stay too long on one task and more than that, they struggle to switch context. This is where multitasking can be unproductive, but sorbet activities can be useful here too.

They can be an enforced break, built into a schedule to help build time management skills and make a new habit - like the Pomodoro technique. A time to switch off from one activity before starting the next and consciously stopping thinking about one thing to create space to switch focus to another. But the challenge for the multi-firing of us whose brains don't work in logical or straight lines is what you do with the break time.

Chunking time is a regular conversation topic with clients when we look at time management and productivity, especially those struggling to get things done because they are always so busy. My clients find that understanding how their brain works and identifying ways to take more control of what they do, how they do it and when they do it is the route to sustainable success.

Identifying and introducing personalised 'sorbet' tasks is a good (and proven) way to help you move from one activity to another, closing off the previous task and getting mentally ready for the next one through distraction and space. They help you make the transition, be more productive and stay focused more effectively.

Another aspect is whether you are multitasking or procrastinating. Thinking you are busy - or too busy to act - isn't about getting things done. It's the avoidance of doing something.

Multitasking can work, but only if you are doing the tasks, not spending your time and energy jumping and switching between them to avoid doing something else.

If you find yourself procrastinating, ask yourself if you need one or more of these three things to enable action:

• Information

• Motivation

• Validation

If you’d like help to identify ways in which you could be more productive and/or less overwhelmed by busy-ness, why not try a session of Career Therapy?

Click ‘Book a call’ on the website for a free intro call or email me at louise@careertherapy.co.uk

Why not follow me for more career confidence-boosting tips, tools and talks:

LinkedIn Louise Newton

Instagram @career_therapy_uk

If you'd like to receive no-fluff, practical insights direct to your inbox, why not sign up for the twice-monthly Career Therapy Newsletter? It’s packed full of thoughtful career support, grounded in years of coaching experience - and real life.

Check out my other articles on careers and confidence: You can grow your confidence, Pick your shine time, 5 steps to building confidence and Want more confidence? Take control. 

Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash