Often it is already difficult alone, generally his focus on something were. However, in our "modern" time, it sometimes seems almost impossible. Why?
I will write here mainly about my experiences and thoughts on this. One of the biggest challenges of my life has always been, and still is, the focus. How also? When 500-thousand thoughts pop into someone's head at once.
I find it harder and harder to keep the focus on one particular thing. Just today I caught myself doing it again. I have two proposals open at the same time, which I still need to finish filling out and submitting. Besides that, the code editor is open in the background, as well as the CMS to write the blog entry here. In addition, WhatsApp is open, Telegram, as well as YouTube is running on a screen somewhere, not music, but a documentary about the First World War.
I'm writing a quote for a client, suddenly I find myself secretly switching to my code editor program, and I'm no longer coding the quote, but another client's website. But in the middle of it, I suddenly open a new project and start to program no longer on the website for a customer, but to develop a personal project, a password manager, because I do not trust known others.
How do you get a handle on that?
Now, a year later, I still catch myself doing it from time to time, but much less often than back then. What was the secret? Reading, opening my eyes, and a dopamine withdrawal!
The former, very simple. I can really recommend Napoleon Hill's book, "Think and grow Rich" to anyone, whether they want to grow personally or grow a business. Of course ONLY the ORIGINAL EDITION from 1937!
A German translation is okay, I have read both versions, but the important thing is to read the original 1937 edition. In newer versions some things are missing, or unnecessary new things that confuse are just there. The edition that is at the top on Amazon, "Revised for the 21st century", is absolutely unnecessary in my eyes.
Secondly:
What do I mean by open your eyes? -> Exactly that ;)
Open your eyes, become aware of your surroundings. Usually people say, don't look at what others are doing, focus only on yourself. This is also true, but there are exceptions, respectively all people function differently / have different triggers. It helped me to look at exactly how the people around me were doing it. Most were even lazier and with even less focus than I was. However, I found two who had a very strong organization, these also had much more free time than the others and were much happier, as well as I had the best and most interesting conversations with these people.
Well, I have taken this behavior as a model. Important here, not the person, but the structure and organizational thinking. I don't believe in idealizing people or having "role models" directly, no person is perfect. I take more role models from people's behavior and/or thinking patterns. For example: Person A is very organized, I take this organization as a role model and ask person A if they might have tips. However, this person is very stuffy and you can rarely have "fun" with this (I at least), so I take a person B, which is always extremely loose and you can have fun in any situation, and it always takes the best out of a situation. I now take this behavior as a target.
So I combine the best of different worlds for me and try to grow.
Number three, definitely what appeals to some people.
Humans have deliberately built in errors (bugs). Addiction is one of them. You can get addicted to anything, be it nicotine, caffeine or sugar. Everything has to be kept in moderation all the time. This includes the consumption of entertainment. When you feel drained and burnt out, there can be many reasons for it. One of them is definitely that the dopamine (happy hormone) household is disturbed. Every entertainment in modern society is geared towards generating as much dopamine as possible in a short period of time. Be it social media, casino, parties, or drug use. Everything is designed to distract.
This does NOT have to be a bad thing per se. Simply switching off once is good, working all the time also drains you at some point. But "distracting", must not become the norm, because otherwise you are used to your dopamine rush, and you need more and more, just like with drugs.... You stay on social media longer, you keep changing the topic and the focus, because you get bored with a task.
What I advise is that you take on something EVERY day, no matter how small, and do it. A fixed structure, the first 3 weeks will be really hard.
Maybe something unnecessary, it does not have to be sports every day, or clean the house every day. Just something small, as stupid as it may seem. It can even be something like, every day this particular plant once sprayed with water. Turning a magnet on the refrigerator every day at a certain time. Also, set a limit on how much time you spend on social media on your phone. This is easy to do in Instagram and Facebook, e.g. only spend a maximum of 45 minutes in these apps at the beginning, and then reduce the daily limit over the weeks until you reach 15-20 minutes.
Final words and BIG PICTURE
It is also important to keep the big picture in mind. The whole thing works easier if you have a purpose and a goal in life. The pension, which will soon no longer exist, is not a goal in life, "living to work". Set yourself something in mind, a goal, read the book what I recommended earlier, that helps you exactly. Enjoy small moments, like I just this brilliantly good coffee.
If you have any questions, like to discuss or need help, feel free to contact me on the website or send me an email on: mp@mauriceputz.org
Best regards and continued success to you, dear reader,
Maurice
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