
The lost art of concentration: being distracted in a digital world - DanielBMarkham
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/oct/14/the-lost-art-of-concentration-being-distracted-in-a-digital-world
======
octygen
Three things helped me:

1) Mindfulness training so I could see myself in the moment NOT concentrating
and stop myself. Still not at 100% with this but have been getting a lot
better since I first took [https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/mindfulness-
wellbeing-pe...](https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/mindfulness-wellbeing-
performance/1) a couple of years ago.

2) Thinking of my mobile in the way marketers think of it. As a cache for
mobile minutes. Each marketing dept is like a little gnome each trying to get
at my treasure. So I cut them off. I deleted all apps with ads and made an
effort to block all ads or suggestions for new content across the digital
things I use via everything from Greasemonkey to plug-ins to switching
providers of services. So now distraction from my digital browsing is
significantly diminished.

3) Re-reading this Michener essay about once a year: [http://www.asahi-
net.or.jp/~xs3d-bull/michener.html](http://www.asahi-
net.or.jp/~xs3d-bull/michener.html). It reminds me that it takes long periods
of time and discipline to create great things. Else they are easily achievable
and don't IMHO qualify as great. This includes everything from putting tons of
time in for Ironman training (quite the physical achievement) to writing a
book (look at Michener's books and how crazy-well-researched and expansive
they are) to having a good relationship with your mate to writing quality code
for your most recent idea. The more the gnomes pick at your little time
treasure, the less time you have to achieve great things.

~~~
tostadora
The Michener essay is a great read. Thank you for the link.

It has made me think about a problem, though: how to select that huge task in
which to pour your energy. For him, it was his novels; but being in a 9 to 5
office job like I am, I'm wondering what are my options.

~~~
bitexploder
Here is what I think. Do you have something you really want to achieve?
Writing a book? Learning something new to advance your career? Whatever it is
you must carve our deep work time for it. Waking up early, etc.

How to select your “whatever it is”. Don’t start small. Think about it every
day. I think this will prime your brain to help you find it. Keep a journal
focused on this. It probably won’t take too long. If you are still hit by
analysis paralysis some times you just have to flip a coin and force a
decision. This catalyst will often make the right choice clear (e.g if the
coin flip lands on a thing you aren’t as excited about).

Final thought, practice deep work at your job. Prime your colleagues for when
you will be in deep work. 2-3 hour stretches are a minimum IMO. Really entire
days are ideal, but 2-3 hour stretches are good enough if they are truly
distraction free.

~~~
maroonblazer
Lately it's been fashionable to downplay the idea of "passion" (try Googling
"don't follow your passion"), but I think it's critical to having any chance
of success at tackling a big problem.

Several years ago I took up jazz drumming and purchased a DVD by the jazz
drummer John Riley. Amidst all the technical lessons that comprise 99% of the
disc he inserted a brief, 1 minute long sidebar on the idea of being "gifted"
at drumming.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ist7xECbDh0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ist7xECbDh0)

Of course it applies to anything, not simply playing the drums.

It caused me to think differently about what kinds of things I'm willing to
spend my time on, simply because doing that thing was most rewarding.

~~~
bitexploder
Passion is almost a Zen concept to me. Follow your passion is great, but, fly
too close to the Sun and you get burned. Passion can be learned in the sense
that you can explore new things and find you have a passion for them. And you
won’t know if you have a passion for some topics until you are deep into them.
I think most smart people can learn to have passion for almost any area where
they have mastery and purpose to achieve. It can be a bit of voodoo “finding
your passion” and you can learn to be passionate about almost anything if it
scratches the right itch, IMO. It is all about expanding horizons. Getting a
job in a hobby or passion can be the worst thing for that passion.

------
leggomylibro
It seems like nowadays, we wring our hands about the effects of constant
access to the internet on a near-daily basis. And isn't it kind of odd that
the people working on these products in an 'individual contributor' capacity
are often the same ones encouraging others to stay away from their platforms?

Maybe that should tell us something. Anecdotally, most of the things that this
article recommends are things that I wholeheartedly enjoyed several years ago,
but tellingly no longer have time for despite a similar schedule.

Reading for pleasure took the biggest hit - I can just listen to an audiobook
or podcast during the commute, right? But it does also feel like I've gotten
worse at persisting in tedious tasks after being interrupted, exercise feels
more like wasted time, and even my breathing exercises are getting shallow and
rapid these days.

What is going on? It's not that thumbing through the news feels like an
accomplishment, and I know that I'll look back on these years and shake my
head at how terribly I'm wasting my time - it's already happening - but this
is a comfortable lifestyle and I just keep on doing it. That does sound like
an addiction, right?

I don't know. But I do know that I've had enough, and I'm coping with it by
planning to spend a couple of years on the road in the hopes that things blow
over and the people of 202x will have this all figured out. And hey, maybe
I'll feel better after forcing myself to be bored for several months.

Because these issues seem so massive and unapproachable that I can't think of
anything to do besides throwing up my hands and leaving. I can't even talk to
other people about it because everybody's noses are in their phones
everywhere. Is that weird?

~~~
deepGem
but this is a comfortable lifestyle and I just keep on doing it. That does
sound like an addiction, right?

I have similar traits that I am actively working to wear off. My only
addictions are Twitter, Hacker News and Yahoo Finance. I spend at least 4
hours in a day flipping across these. I must admit Twitter is quite helpful
because my feed is well curated. YF is a total waste of time - I don't know
why I keep checking the stock prices when I know for a fact I won't sell
anything. It satisfies some part of my brain to keep watching the tickers.
What a fucking waste. Hacker News is useful too. What has helped me in the
beginnings of my de-addiction is measuring how much time I am wasting and
writing it down. It's kind of a slap in the face to get up in the morning and
see that you wasted 4 hours the previous day.

I can't even talk to other people about it because everybody's noses are in
their phones everywhere. Is that weird?

Perhaps hanging out at an old fashioned bar might not be bad. Not the ones
with fancy music but the ones that remain somewhat rustic, where you can just
have a beer and a random conversation.

~~~
codyb
The new Apple screen time app really is a tremendous addition to see just how
bad it is. A lot of time on my phone I'm doing things that I still consider
productive like reading technical articles, and doing my anki cards, but the
amount of time I can spend looking at my phone is absolutely outlandish in a
given day of free time.

My big time sucks are hn, fark for news, and occasionally reddit. I'd like to
at least drop reddit from my routine, and maybe only come to hackernews when
I've gotten through every other article open on my phone.

Seem like good goals. The screen time app is nice because you can actually set
limits on how much you can use an app then it bugs you with a warning.

I've been trying to read more lately, it's wonderful. Just finished For Whom
the Bell Tolls, and started in on some Kafka. But it's definitely different
then when I was younger and would just tear books up.

I think maybe I'll blacklist reddit at least with the proxy on my phone and
then only browse that on the laptop which would be much rarer and far less
likely since there's so many more interesting things to do on the computer (I
just discovered the joys of tmux, how was I missing you all these years? With
tmuxp, what a powerful set of tools.)

Anyways, that's my experiences, these little gadgets are incredibly addicting,
and with three link aggregates with nigh on never ending pages of links it's
ridiculously easy to spend a tremendous amount of time with your face in the
screen.

~~~
deepGem
But it's definitely different then when I was younger and would just tear
books up.

When I was 19, I finished John Grisham's The Partner in one sitting - without
even getting up for food. Something like 24-30 hours non stop reading. There's
no way in hell I'll be able to do that now.

~~~
tfandango
I never read a whole book in one sitting, but I could read for hours. For me
it wasn't the internet/phone distractions that broke me of that ability, it
was having kids. There was just not time to do that anymore. Now, for better
or worse, I still read a lot of books but in very small rapid chunks, even
standing in line at the store. I treasure the times when I can go to bed and
read for an hour or so, though I usually just fall asleep after 20 minutes.

------
samzer
After using facebook for 8 years, I had reached a point where I stopped
posting content but couldn't stop consuming the content posted by others and
also logging into facebook without even thinking. I tried multiple times to
deactivate the account but it always resulted in reactivating it. The two main
reasons for it was the herd mentality and the FOMO.

I needed a new approach, I started by unfollowing people and pages that made
me react. I realized the most important part of facebook for me was keeping in
touch with people and not the posts that they share so decided to unfollow
everyone which includes pages and groups too. The annoying part is that it is
not easy to unfollow everyone and you have to do it one by one. I found a post
with some js code that helped in achieving this and it worked, don't know if
it will work now - [https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-unfollow-everyone-on-
Facebook...](https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-unfollow-everyone-on-Facebook-at-
once)

After about 8 months of using facebook this way,I checked how many
conversations I had using the messenger which turned out to be in the lower
end of the single digit. Finally, I decided to go ahead with the deletion of
facebook after backing up all my data. Once you hit delete, it gives 14 days
of thinking time in case you decide to change your mind. After deleting the
account, it took me almost 2 months to stop my reflex action of going to
facebook login page.

Its been more than 6 months I've deleted facebook, I'm not missing it, I
hardly think about it and quite happy that I'm out of it.

~~~
raffael-vogler
> After using facebook for 8 years, I had reached a point where I stopped
> posting content but couldn't stop consuming the content posted by others and
> also logging into facebook without even thinking. I tried multiple times to
> deactivate the account but it always resulted in reactivating it. The two
> main reasons for it was the herd mentality and the FOMO.

I'd argue that deeply reflecting on this offers a huge potential for personal
growth. Why the fear of missing out? To me it seems more and more clear that
the only thing to miss out on is the present moment as it is for me right here
and right now.

> The annoying part is that it is not easy to unfollow everyone and you have
> to do it one by one. I found a post with some js code that helped in
> achieving this and it worked, don't know if it will work now

I guess with Facebook and its siblings this is an uphill battle as they will
always try to come up with new ways to prevent you from pursuing precisely
those kind of goals.

> Its been more than 6 months I've deleted facebook, I'm not missing it, I
> hardly think about it and quite happy that I'm out of it.

Congratulations on that!

------
woogiewonka
One of my biggest distractions for years has been email. I just have to have
my inbox at zero and used to check my email religiously, from every few
minutes to every few hours. I'd check email in the bathroom, in bed, at the
table .. it was getting ridiculous. The things is, I never got any interesting
email worth checking - it was always the same pattern: swipe - delete. So I
decided to do something about it.

I figured checking email once or at most twice per day would be enough so I
took took a few steps to accomplish this:

1\. Moved the email icon from my phone into an obscure folder hidden on the
very last screen on my phone. Now, instead of clicking it right away I have to
actively find it which is kind of a pain.

2\. Installed SelfControl for Mac and added gmail.com, facebook (yes I still
have a shell account I use to check one group), reddit, ycombinator, twitter
and a host of other news sites I may occasionally visit to the black list. The
first thing I do in the morning is set that timer for almost the entirety of
the day and hit start. Now everything is literally blocked and I cannot access
it without turning off SelfControl which I have yet to do. Some days I make an
exception and leave hacker news off the list.

What I really want now is a product, app or SOMETHING that just turns off
everything, including notifications at a click of tap of a button - across all
devices simultaenteouly. Turn of all notifications, popups, alerts, all the
garbage that comes up through the day including phone calls, messages,
Facetime.. just everything. I don't care if it's an emergency, I don't care if
someone died, I don't care if checking the phone will save my life. Just turn
it all off, but give me access to the apps I still use.

~~~
raffael-vogler
For me it seems that in times of instant messaging email is the saviour in
personal communication - not in professional context though (I still prefer an
email over being called many times over). When it comes to private messaging
people tend to write mails more with a mindset of writing a letter. Full
sentences and the entire communication structure seems to be aimed at being
complete and more thoughtful. IMing often feels more like ping pong than
actually conversing.

------
organman91
CGP Grey discussed this on a recent Hello Internet episode [1], that he was
concerned by his inability to maintain focus on a single task (such as reading
a book) for more than several minutes. He specifically notes that Reddit and
HN were major contributors to this.

1\.
[http://www.hellointernet.fm/podcast/108](http://www.hellointernet.fm/podcast/108)
(about the 1 hr 15 min mark)

------
InclinedPlane
People have short attention spans. It was not so very long ago (and indeed it
is still quite common today) when the standard way that one "lived" their life
was to spend 8 hours a day at work and then most of the remainder watching
television.

Yes, compared to the ideal, having your nose in your phone to the detriment of
all other activities is undesirable, but compared to the actuality of what
came before it might be an improvement.

~~~
jsemrau
I would counter argument that in the past TV was a shared experience while
staring at one's phone is a single experience.

~~~
InclinedPlane
I would counter-counter argue that using a smartphone is much more of a social
experience than TV, and can be less interruptive as well.

Much of the time when people are using their phones they are socializing
asynchronously or synchronously with their friends and family. They are
following what's happening in their lives through twitter, facebook,
instagram, etc. They are keeping in touch through instant messaging (on
facebook, through google hangouts, texting, what-have-you). They are keeping
up with current news and events. They are keeping themselves informed, etc.

And in terms of the presence of media in the physical space _sometimes_
watching TV with others can be a social experience, but it can also be an
anti-social experience by draining attention away from conversations and by
having something of interest going on that can't easily be interrupted or
paused to do something else. Whereas smartphone use _can_ more often be
interrupted or paused.

My own anecdotal experience is that television is much worse of an attention
hog than smartphones, on average.

------
reasonablemann
My internet cut out last week for four hours while my phone was busted.

I spent an hour listening to this podcast I'd downloaded a week earlier:
[https://fs.blog/naval-ravikant/](https://fs.blog/naval-ravikant/)

And then spent a few hours thinking about what was said.

It was the most peaceful evening I've had all year.

~~~
jsemrau
> It was the most peaceful evening I've had all year.

That's a really powerful statement to make. Lately, I am have become addicted
to riding my bicycle to the office. The main reason is that I have 30 min each
way to not care about emails, news, etc.

~~~
agumonkey
Says a thing about the reality of human impedance [mis]match with the modern
life fantasy. Moving one's butt in nature is probably more tuned to our
system.

------
hevi_jos
Distraction is not new. We love doing things with instant gratification and
anything of great value comes from deep work.

What it is new today is that people are fighting against a football team of
Doctors in Psychology, experts manipulators that have sold their soul to the
"Man", Google, Facebook... in order to enslave people following their primal
impulses for the benefit of those Juggernauts, and the manipulators
themselves, pretty happy to receive a fat check for their services.

The first thing you need to do in order to become free of their extensive web
of control is to be conscious of their unfair game.

If you try to fight , alone, you will lose. Those guys know much more about
you and humanity that you could ever grasp. Theoretically they hire experts in
human behavior. In practice they know what thousands of millions of people do
for real. They hold the emails, they have cameras and microphones on people's
rooms, they follow your GPS signal on real time.

If you want to be a creator, free of distraction, the winning strategy is not
to play. Use digital services that you pay and own, and associate with other
creators because alone you are too weak.

~~~
tangaye
Thank you very much. I find this very insightful and eyeopening. What are
resources that I can pay attention to in order to be "conscious of their
unfair game"? Will wholeheartedly appreciate it. Thank you once again.

------
mario0b1
I often felt that I was getting distracted way too much, but I couldn't stop
it. About a year ago when my depression got back on track I just shut myself
off of every service I had. I quit facebook, deleted all unnecessary apps from
my phone, muted it completly and turned off the thing that the display lights
up if you get a new message. I even let my phone at home when I was not
expecting any major call. If people called me I just called them back when I
was at home and had time for it. All of this went out way better than I ever
would've thought. I feel super relieved and relaxed nowadays. Because I
started a new job I carry my phone with me now most of the day, but it is
still muted most of the time. It is even fun to see if there is something new
on the internet without getting notified about it instantly. Now I decide when
I want to take a break and what I want to look for, not my Smartphone or
something else.

------
hiei
This is one of the reasons I still have a few subscriptions to magazines. No
micro-distractions, just long form journalism.

~~~
moltar
Which magazines aren’t 90% ads and the remaining 10% long form ads? Genuinely
interested as I haven’t seen any good mags in a while.

~~~
carrier_lost
Lapham’s Quarterly:
[https://www.laphamsquarterly.org](https://www.laphamsquarterly.org)

------
bsimpson
I love that every time the monkey[0] distracts me today, the top link is about
distraction. Reminds me to get back to work.

[0] [https://waitbutwhy.com/2013/10/why-procrastinators-
procrasti...](https://waitbutwhy.com/2013/10/why-procrastinators-
procrastinate.html)

------
flycaliguy
That's it, I'm deleting my hacker news bookmark. I've been on a good kick
lately looking at old illustrations in books on archive.org. I've started
reading around them and there is some pretty neat stuff written by people who
never logged on.

~~~
sundvor
My fingers can touch type the url autonomously, before I even realise what's
happening. That's why I need the hosts entry block at work..

------
fogetti
It's hard to take these articles seriously. Do these psychologists think that
the average person's issue is they get distracted 60 times a day on their
weekends? Who cares about that???

My problem is that I get interrupted 160 times a day in my workplace!!! How do
these suggestions help me in my workplace? Shall I tell my boss that I can't
reply his email right now because I am counting back in sevens from 1000 or
what???

~~~
erikpukinskis
Tell your boss you check email three times a day, in the morning, after lunch,
and before leaving work. And if she/he has something urgent to please slack
you directly. If necessary create a filter that lets people add an #urgent tag
to the subject that sends you a notification.

Then turn off email and slack notifications for all but the rooms centered on
things you are directly responsible for. Police those groups so they are only
critical isssues that the whole team should be addressing. Create a second
channel for casual discussion if need be.

I don’t know... maybe none of these work but just try something. If you can’t
change anything at least keep a log of all your interruptions and the general
category of issue, so that you can talk about it with your boss in an informed
way at your next 1 on 1.

------
gfs78
My best strategy is to avoid the distractions from the get go.

I don't browse the web until I finish my workday. If I need to look up
something (which must be work related) I just browse the minimum needed to get
the answer. I don't browse to the related links.

With my smartphone is the same. I turn off all notifications and leave it in
my bag (if I'm at office) or in another room (if I'm working from home).

My focus, calmness and confidence skyrocket when I do this.

------
Tade0
I rediscovered(after 10 years or so) a half-solution the other day: any
activity that requires focus but is done offline(so not programming nowadays,
unless you have your docs/tutorials/etc offline).

In my case it's making music. The product is obviously crap and takes _a lot_
of time to create, but it has done wonders to my ability to focus.

~~~
raffael-vogler
Just yesterday evening I had a quick look for old-fashioned chess computers.
Who needs a chess computer when you have a real computer or a tablet? The
difference is that with a chess computer you are offline.

------
tw1010
I typically think of this as a unique advantage that programmers have. In
almost every other industry I see, I see people who never get the chance to
focus all their attention on intellectually challenging tasks for hours
without break, and a lot of them seem super distracted and like their brain
have been negatively affected by this absence. But programmers seem like the
rare species that actually do get this privilege, and this is usually the
reason I prefer intellectual conversations with coders than almost anyone else
(even when the topic is something other than engineering).

~~~
random_kris
I agree with you. But lately I've been noticing myself being distracted a lot
and finding it hard to concentrate... for example I have a hard problem in
front of me and in the momment something goes wrong I just switch task and go
on hn/reddit/mail etc...

~~~
tw1010
Habituating myself with music and special rooms that I'm very strict about
associating only to work (never play) has been the key for me. Play music when
you work, and be very strict about not playing the same track/genre when you
go on hn/reddit. Sometimes I stand up when people speak to me, just so I don't
encourage my mind to allow "conversation thoughts" to bubble up from my
subconsious when I'm in a chair. If you're strict about this, and you do it
for long enough, it becomes much easier. (Don't be too hard on yourself when
you fail, let it take the time it needs to take, be patient. And be careful
once you've reached the good habit state. Remember how fragile it is and how
much effort was required to get to that point.)

------
brootstrap
Might be coming across as an asshole but it's not that hard for me to ignore
digital things. Sure i have a bad habit of looking to my phone and opening HN
but... When i'm at home i will leave phone sitting somewhere (forgot where i
left it) for hours and ignore people. I can run and exercise and listen to the
sounds of nature. The problem I have is that at work you are plugged into the
browser 8-10 hours a day and instantly searching everything. When you get home
it takes a bit of focus to just live and not be staring at a screen. It is
possible though.

------
clubm8
I have a cell phone plan with limited data. At first it was just a frugality
thing, but it's also done wonders for attention/mindfulness. I tend to listen
to podcasts instead of mindlessly FB/Redditing. Not only does it clear my
mind, but listening to the news instead of constantly refreshing a news site
throughout the day saves time and decreases stress and "FOMO" (fear of missing
out). I know I'm missing out - I've chosen to! :)

------
jacquesm
As a tech fanatic here is my way of dealing with it:

\- no smartphone

\- as little social media as possible (yes, I know)

\- when with family or others the phone is on silent and I won't answer or
text

\- adblockers and privacy tools used to the max to get rid of advertising

\- no TV

\- no radio

Between all those tricks I can get a half decent day's work _and_ still spend
time on others, though I have to admit that the better the business is doing
there is still pressure there that will need to be relieved somehow.

------
agumonkey
Anybody ever felt relieved when their ISP was down ?

------
momentmaker
The book War of Art by Steven Pressfield is a great book talking about this.
Half of the battle is procrastination. One has to do develop a routine and
stick to it never what. Concentration will come from that.

------
Terretta
They mentioned a variety of apps, but w/o discussion of iOS 12 “Screen Time”
(best if enabled for All Devices).

That data can be jarring enough to motivate habit change.

------
raffael-vogler
This is an ongoing battle for me. I do make progress but it seems that the
fundamental design of our culture and society is just increasingly depending
and requiring to be online all the time. But I found that a set of simple
rituals will go a long way.

> We check our phones every 12 minutes, often just after waking up.

First of all I reduced my involvement with services that cause me to check my
phone. I don't use Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Twitter. I even blocked
youtube.com and youtu.be on my computers.

At some point in the evening I will switch off my phone and keep it in the
living room when going to bed. That solved my terrible habit of reading
reddit, HN etc while lying in bed intending to sleep. After stopping this I
realized how detrimentally this impacted my sleep quality. It also keeps me
from immediately reaching for my phone upon waking up. Now I'll do several
things before giving attention to my phone.

> more and more experts are telling us that these interruptions and
> distractions have eroded our ability to concentrate.

I guess a lot of people will argue that it didn't erode anything but instead
just changed our ability to concentrate - in the sense of evolutionary
addaption - but I will argue that this is in deed a negative development. I do
this confidently from a position of personal experience. It simply doesn't
feel good. And a lot of people who claim they like being on and conneceted
24/7 seem nervous and anxious to me.

> More than half of the 1,100 participants said they always responded to an
> email immediately or as soon as possible, while 21% admitted they would
> interrupt a meeting to do so.

That's one of the first things to learn on a job - not to respond to mails
immediately. It seems this will just trigger the next mail and establish an
expectation to receive fast response from me at all times. In the end it will
just snowball and suddenly I'm only writing mails all day long.

> ... The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.”

I observed that with me, too. The antidote is naturally to read more lengthy
texts like books. Sitting down and just reading a book in the evening feels
sometimes like therapy - but in a good way. (Currently I'm reading Twain's "A
Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court")

> Start by switching off smartphone alerts, or taking social media apps off
> your phone, then switching off the device for increasingly long periods.

I even got me second (dumb) phone (Bea C65). It's number one feature is that
it can do nothing except calling and SMS. Also the number is known currently
only to my girlfriend. I take it with me when I am certain that I won't need
my smartphone. No way to check about Seehofer or Kashogghi on sueddeutsche.de.

> Most of us breathe poorly: ...

I practice various kinds of meditation - currently twice a day for half an
hour each. Body Scan, Zen meditation, Wim Hof breathing, Pranayama inspired
breathing etc. This is easily the most important and healthy habit for me at
the moment.

> Although any type of light can inhibit sleep, research has shown that light
> towards the blue end of the spectrum is especially effective at keeping you
> awake because it stimulates the retina in the eye and inhibits the secretion
> of melatonin from the pineal gland in the brain.

In hindsight I have to conclude that reducing brightness on my S7 to lowest
setting + activating the blue light filter + using a special app to reduce the
brightness even further was not sufficient to prevent sleep issues.

------
spencore
i would love to read this... but, ya know...

