Distractions Archives - Remarkable Difference ADHD Coaching

Are Distractions Ruining Your Life? How to Fix What’s Wiping out Your Focus.

What can you do to help yourself focus and be more productive when distractions keep getting in the way? Whether you find it practically impossible to concentrate in a busy environment, or you’re zoning out while listening to someone, distractions can rule your life and prevent you from doing and achieving the things you want to get done.

Everyone can get distracted at times, yet for people with ADHD “Distractibility” is one of the major symptoms, often affecting us continuously from morning to night. Knowing when, where, and how you’re getting distracted is a good starting point to doing something to improve your situation. Lists, charts, graphics, or voice recordings of your distractions are just some of the ways you could collect this information.

Follow these pointers to create your unique Personal Distraction Profile:

When do you typically get distracted?

Is it when you are talking to someone and you start to follow a train of thought sparked off by something they said, pulling you away from what the person is saying? Perhaps it’s being in a noisy, busy environment at work when your concentration is broken by phones ringing, or people coming and going, and asking you things. Or maybe it’s when you start a domestic clear out, and you find so many interesting things that distract you. All of a sudden, hours have gone by, and nothing gets done.

So, identify when you get distracted and record the times you get pulled off focus.

Where are you most often distracted?

Is it at work, where the chairs are uncomfortable, so your back begins to ache, and the discomfort is hard to ignore? Or at home, where the thought of unpaid bills distracts you from the task in hand, and the dinner gets burned – again!

Perhaps you are out for a meal somewhere with friends, only the music and conversations together make it virtually impossible to hear what anyone is saying, so you spend the evening feeling isolated and on the edge of things.

Make a note of these places and add them to the record.

How do you get distracted?

We are all individuals, and one way to understand and identify your unique brand of distractions is knowing how you take in and then process information. You take in information through your senses. Depending on individual processing styles, one or more of your senses can be the source of many distractions.

It can be useful to divide distractions into two main categories; external and internal. Continue to add any more instances to the data you’re compiling about yourself.

External distractions can be anything entering your field of awareness via your senses – this could be the regular five senses:

· hearing,

· visual,

· tactile or felt,

· smell,

· taste.

In addition, some individuals are affected by:

· temperature changes or extremes,

· perception of where their body is in space,

· sense of balance.

People respond differently to these stimuli – some people will find the subtlest sounds or movements distracting, while others won’t even be aware of them.

Then there are internal distractions. These can be things like:

· thoughts,

· feelings,

· emotions,

· images,

· memories etc.

Add this information to your Distractions Profile.

Now pinpoint any emerging patterns and consider how you could better manage them.

For instance, do sounds distract you and interrupt your train of thought when writing emails? You could try wearing ear defenders, moving to a quieter place, or changing the time of day you work on them, so that you are sure to be in a quiet environment.

Or maybe it’s the visual distraction of other people around you, moving around or walking past that you find most distracting? Try working in a room on your own, using a screen, or turning your desk to face the wall.

Perhaps you are repeatedly distracted by memories that get triggered by seeing a place, person, or object? Before you know it, you are off down memory lane, and time is ticking by. Many of my clients have found Mindfulness practice can help with being more present. Over time, regular Mindfulness practice can reduce instances of getting lost in thoughts and emotions for long periods.

It’s worth bearing in mind that each type of distraction has its own solutions. Being more precise about what your distractions are will help you customize your responses with more success.

In summary, to build up your Personal Distraction Profile, identify and record:

· WHEN you get distracted.

· WHERE you get distracted.

· HOW you get distracted.

· your external distractions.

· your internal distractions.

Make additions to your profile whenever you find yourself pulled away from things, unproductive or overwhelmed, or when you find you’ve lost track of time.

The final step is to identify any recurring patterns, and think of some action(s) you could take based on your findings.

If you don’t feel up for doing this alone, why not ask for help from a trusted friend. Alternatively, you could engage a specialist in coping with distractions such as an ADHD Coach to assist you.

Once you have identified your times, places and types of distraction you will be in a much stronger position. Then you can take positive action to reduce or eliminate them. Your focus and productivity will increase as a result!

Anna Schlapp, AACC, ACC, is a certified ADHD coach who specialises in creative solutions to triumph over the hurdles of ADHD. Anna helps those with challenges in focus and attention to co-create personalised blueprints for leading more amazing lives. Read more of Anna’s strategies for empowered productivity on her blog. To find out how Anna’s unique system can help you maximise your potential, ask about a complimentary coaching session.

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Challenges of ADHD: producing creative work consistently.

What can make it hard for creatives with ADHD to produce work consistently over time? And what can help? Part one of a two-part blog.

For me the definition of creating on a consistent basis means to create something regularly. Many of us in creative fields need to be able to produce work on a regular basis in order to keep income flowing in. There are projects to complete, work to hand on to others where work involves more than one person, due dates for submission, deliveries to consider, publishing deadlines to meet.

You could say that producing work consistently is going to involve several different stages

Having initial ideas
Preparation and planning
Getting started
Carrying out the work, and continuing to work on it over time making adjustments as needed.
Getting it finished and out of the door.

I hear a lot from people with ADHD who tell me they are able to do something quite well for a while, then it lapses for one reason or another. It can be days, weeks, or months before they realise they have stopped, and even longer before they find a way to return to it.

Could it be due to novelty wearing off?

Could it be that the buzz that comes from achieving something at first, is no longer providing the juice of motivation needed to continue, as soon as it begins to become routine?

Could it be to do with getting easily thrown off course by external events like interruptions or distractions?

Could it be because self-directed transitions are hard for those of us with ADHD, so returning to something again once you have stopped presents problems?

There are many possible answers to this conundrum, as everyone has their own particular “brand” of ADHD. Yes, we are all different.

Years ago I used to believe that I could only paint when I felt like it. Then, on occasions when I did feel like it, I would not be organised enough in my materials to make a start. By not organised enough I mean, for example, that my paper would be stored in one place, my paints and brushes in another, and I didn’t have a dedicated clear workspace to work in, etc. This caused me no end of frustration, as I often could not find what I was looking for, and on many occasions I spent so long looking with no success, that I finally gave up in disgust. Painting accomplished – nil.

I also think on reflection that I may have been slightly affected by inflexible thinking, as I would get hyper-focused on finding the exact brush or paper that I had thought of using, whereas, looking back now I wonder, why didn’t I just use my creativity to improvise and do something else?

Hyperfocus is an interesting one for ADHD creatives, as it can either take the form of “helpful hyperfocus” which enables us to be immensely productive, or “hindering hyperfocus”, as in the example above. Sometimes we can experience a combination of both! I’ll have more to say about hyperfocus and creativity in a future blog.

In the end, once I realised that ADHD was an issue for me, I found a great piece of advice by Dr. Ned Hallowell. His recommendation is to only get as organised as you need to, to achieve what you want, without taking organisation too far and getting embroiled in perfectionism. Doing this has certainly helped take my own productivity in painting to a whole new level.

For now, here are three tips you can try, if producing work consistently is eluding you.

TIP one: To help take that first step towards creating, have everything you need set up in advance for yourself and to hand, so that it becomes really easy to begin. Preparation is one key to avoiding frustration and inertia.

TIP two: If getting prepared seems like a bit of a chore, try separating it out into a standalone activity, and then take a break and go away. Making yourself a drink or going for a walk can provide enough of a break for it to seem like a completely separate activity. Then when you return to begin your creative project, voila! There is your workspace and everything you need to get started immediately. Getting going feels much smoother and more effortless.

TIP three: Beware of thoughts telling you it has to be done in a certain way. You’re a creative after all; some of the best inventions and creations in the world have come from happy accidents or from people making it up as they go along. Keep that inner flexibility and creative muscle well-exercised.

Another thing to understand is that if we wait until our brains and bodies are in the state we believe is ideal for creating before we begin, like I used to, then we risk either at worst not achieving anything at all, or at best only a fraction of what we could be capable of.

So instead of the “Do I feel inspired to create today?” criteria, we need some other way of getting ourselves to create regularly – which is what I understand by consistency. Someone once said that our lives are defined by the questions we ask ourselves.

What might we be capable of if we changed the question above to, “What do I feel inspired to create today?” Feel the difference in those two questions. The first asks for a simple yes or no answer, while the second question opens up a whole world of possibilities.

What kind of questions are you asking yourself when you set out to create something? The first kind, or the second? And which will you be using next time?

In part two of this blog we will be examining ways to get unstuck if your creative projects grind to a halt.

Anna Schlapp B.A., AACC, ACC, is a certified coach with the ADD Coach Academy and the International Coach Federation. Specialising in ADHD and Creativity, Anna helps talented people like you find ways of being more creatively productive and productively creative.

Get in touch to schedule your complimentary coaching session with Coach Anna.