How to stop being distracted

Distractions prevent us from focussing on the important things.  They come in all shapes and sizes, pulling us away and causing us to feel as though we are losing control.  They may be trivial items such as internet browsing, or more ‘serious’ items such as emails and other work, but not the work that we really need to get to.  We beat ourselves up and blame ourselves for lacking self-discipline and organisational skills, but we can’t seem to break the cycle, why is this?

Let us examine what a distraction really is. The clue is contained in the very definition of the word.  A distraction is “an interruption; an obstacle to concentration”, in other words an obstacle that is blocking you or preventing you from ‘seeing’ the item upon which you should be focussing.

Now distractions are not sent our way by a host of mischievous elves with nothing better to do than create turmoil in our work or personal lives.  The truth of the matter is that distractions are mechanisms that we are guilty of putting in place in order to avoid that which we should be targeting.  And the avoidance has become so habitual that we don’t even notice we are doing it anymore.

The hard truth is this: the important thing you really should be doing, you are actually avoiding by allowing your brain to be entertained with other things.  The reasons for task avoidance vary depending on the situation, but they all boil down to the feelings you have attached to the task that you are avoiding. And it is these feelings that you are really avoiding, not the task itself.

Being honest with yourself and identifying the emotions that you have surrounding the task you are avoiding will enable you to rationally approach the task with a clearer perspective. 

But how do you prevent yourself being distracted?

Learn to categorise the sources of your distractions.  Some may be purely pleasurable and you may be craving some ‘me-time’. You should allow yourself this, but only once you have made a dent in the work that you need to accomplish.  Some may be other work-related items which you can better prioritise for another time of your day.  And then there are trivial distractions which do not offer any benefit; these should simply be eliminated.

Awareness of the real cause of distraction is the secret to regaining control.

For more information on overcoming distractions and procrastination, contact us at The Time Clinic on www.timeclinic.co.za

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The power of the onion – in business and personal life!

Being successful in both our work and personal lives can be immensely challenging.  And when faced with these challenges alone, it is human to feel overwhelmed and alone at times.  Yet there is so much we can learn from one another, so much we can benefit from personal influences, and so much we can benefit from the support of the right networks.

The creation of the onion is a technique that was taught to me many years ago by an amazing counsellor, and is receiving more media attention these days in popular psychology.  An onion is an analogy to describe how one should view the relationships we form.  As an onion has many layers, so our relationships can be placed within the perspective of ‘layers’.  Your inner layer is your closest and most trusted relationships, whilst the further layers from your core tend to be the more superficial relationships that you may still value, but will spend less time on and which offer you less intrinsic value.  

The truth is we all use the onion model intuitively to some extent or another. However, it is possible that your onion at certain times of your life can quite literally stink!  The quality of your innermost layers are paramount to your health and wellbeing.  Sometimes our inner layers contain people who really belong in the external layers and are demanding too much of our time.  Who have you chosen to keep closest to you?  We need to assess if we are getting support from these people we hold closest.  We need to evaluate if these relationships are offering us opportunities for personal growth.  And we must not neglect our role in maintaining and nurturing these relationships to ensure our inner core remains healthy.

The onion is first and foremost a useful way to effectively time manage your relationships– by evaluating the relationships that are most important to you, you are better able to prioritise those relationships that you should be spending more time on. 

We should also be creating separate onions for both our business and personal lives. 

Yet very few people consider this model when viewing their business relationships, and constructing an onion for your work life is important and advantageous to your personal development.  Your business network should include relationships that inspire and challenge you.  There is a lot to be said for the company we keep!  Find opportunities to surround yourself with people that are successful, inspirational and role models or mentors.  Place these people in your onion! 

Also include people that you would select if you had to employ your own personal ‘board of directors’.  Keep these people around you, try to lean on them, but always make sure the relationships are reciprocal, to the extent that the layer of your onion warrants! 

And finally include people in your ‘business onion’ that are influential, contacts who have great networks that you can leverage off.  These networks will soon feed into one another and soon you will become an influential networker yourself!

Robert Kiyosaki has to say, “The richest people look for and build networks, everyone else looks for work.”   Relationships are truly key to your effectiveness, therefore consider prioritising your relationships using the onion for dramatic effect in both your personal and business life.

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How to get the most out of your relaxation time

In order to be effective and maintain a healthy work-life balance, we need to ensure we make the most of our personal rest and relaxation opportunities in order to return to our respective careers refreshed, revitalised and with a handle on our stress management. But how many of us are getting the proper rest we need? The types of recreational activities that you indulge in can have a major impact upon your mental and physical wellbeing impacting not only your time management, but your stress management and overall vitality.

How many of us are guilty of regarding television as a ‘well earned’ treat after a hard day or a hard week of work? Yet research indicates that television not only causes us to be more depressed, but results in diminished IQ, reduced vitality and satisfaction with life, reduced libido, increased obesity and risk of heart attack/ stroke, increased consumerism and desire to spend money and a definite negative impact upon relationships and communication!

Now this does not mean that you must throw your television set in the trash can. However, be conscious of how distracting this device is and how easily it is to spend hours of your life consumed by mindless material that you did not even plan to watch.

So instead of spending our rest and relaxation time on a pursuit that is not going to bring us satisfaction, what are the alternatives? 

Active relaxation is shown to provide far greater rewards.  Active relaxation includes activities such as outdoor activities including hiking, picnics, sports and participating in hobbies and social events.  At the end of your evening or weekend, chances are that you not only have a tan to show off, but might have lost a kilo or two and spent some really quality time with friends and family.  Active relaxation enables you to release stress and enjoy the important things in life.  To live your life, rather than the lives of synthetic creations on a television screen.

The more opportunities we can create to engage in active relaxation, the better our stress levels and the more renewed and revitalised we will feel enabling us to handle life’s everyday challenges.  Ironically, in order to rest and relax, getting active is often the best choice!  

For more information on achieving a healthy work-life balance contact us at The Time Clinic on www.timeclinic.co.za

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What can you do about late employees?

Many managers struggle with this common complaint. A talented and dedicated employee starts to become repeatedly late for work. Disciplinary action seems a harsh measure when the employee is valued, yet the manager is torn as to not take action would mean applying double standards!  But is disciplinary action really the solution? Perhaps a psychological approach needs to be applied to this problem of time management.

The first thing we need to examine is why is that the employee is late for work? Contrary to popular belief, lateness is not a personality trait, but rather a behaviour.  And behaviour is something that arises from our attitudes, emotions and habits.  So let us examine what is going on with the employee’s attitudes, emotions and habits. 

A very common attitude that we encounter on The Time Clinic is the following.  “I put in so many hours overtime, and then the one day I am five minutes late for work, I am in the dogbox!”  If we examine this statement, there are two things going on here; firstly a distinct sense of being taken for granted, not being noticed, being unappreciated and secondly an increasing sense of resentment. 

It makes sense that an employee who feels that they are dedicating so much of their personal time and committing so much of themselves to further the goals of the organisation would feel a sense of resentment when they are not being noticed or appreciated.  It makes even more sense that this feeling would escalate to boiling point when the very same employee is criticised for being late for work, when, in their eyes, they should be able to ‘cash in’ some of the time they have put in after hours.  Although this does not work in reality, the sense of resentment will mount.  So instead of disciplining a dedicated and committed employee, the very first step is to start by having some empathy for them. But then what?  Surely we cannot allow for special circumstances and allow special cases to arrive for work whenever it suits them?

Indeed! Unless your organisation is practising flexitime, there are rules that are stipulated and need to be adhered to lest the balance of your employees begins to practice resentment too! So how do we turn this situation around?

We need to start by addressing the source of the resentment which is the employee’s feeling of being taken for granted and not being recognised.  Every human being wants to be heard, appreciated and noticed – especially an employee who is going the extra mile!  Start by scheduling regular sessions with your staff member to discuss their workload, commend them on their achievements and acknowledge their commitments. Acknowledge, inspire and provide guidance.  This is true leadership!

As soon as the channels of communication have been re-established, you are now in a better position to raise the issue of punctuality.  You may even find the behaviour corrects itself!  But if not, it is time to have a discussion highlighting the fact that despite the challenges the staff member may have, it is important to acknowledge the rules of the organisation and make an effort to be on time for work as this behaviour has negative consequences for not only the staff member but also the morale of the department.

Attitudes affect emotions and emotions affect behaviour.  Behaviour eventually becomes habit. This is crucial to understand.  Your late employee may have already developed a ‘late’ habit.  Tolerance may be required as your staff member may need to practice to correct their behaviour. Perhaps they need to work at finding the ideal time to leave home, find new routes to work or wake up earlier.  We need to allow people opportunities to make mistakes and change our wording so when we make mistakes we are not ‘failing’ but rather ‘practicing’ until competence is achieved.  Discuss the reasons your staff member is late and find solutions together.  A supportive environment will motivate your employee to exceed your expectations whereas a stick approach will always result in resentment and ultimately rebellion.

Always incorporate the human element it into your management style for dramatic results and remember that time management is about more than managing one’s time – there is always deeper stuff going on!  For more information about time management training contact info@timeclinic.co.za

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Is time slipping away?

An often overlooked factor that affects our time management is our perception of time which, when off balance, will ultimately affect our time management!

Our minds certainly do play tricks on us. Consider for a moment: are you able to gauge how much time has passed while working on a task? Or do you find yourself getting a fright when you look at the clock? It makes sense that our perception of time needs to be examined as a factor that influences our time management! An incorrect perception of time can result in lateness, bad planning and ‘time simply slipping away’ without us even noticing it!

So what are the factors that can skew our perception of time?

Acclaimed BBC broadcaster and psychology writer Claudia Hammond explores this very topic in her book Time Warped: Unlocking the Mysteries of Time Perception.  She says,“We construct the experience of time in our minds, so it follows that we are able to change the elements we find troubling — whether it’s trying to stop the years racing past, or speeding up time when we’re stuck in a queue, trying to live more in the present, or working out how long ago we last saw our old friends. Time can be a friend, but it can also be an enemy. The trick is to harness it, whether at home, at work, or even in social policy, and to work in line with our conception of time. Time perception matters because it is the experience of time that roots us in our mental reality. Time is not only at the heart of the way we organize life, but the way we experience it.”

Hammond uses the following examples of how our time perception can play tricks on us.  Have you ever been in a car accident and felt time literally stand still? Or noticed as you grow older, the decades seem to simply fly by?  According to Hammond, time seems to speed up when we are getting older.

When we are cold, we also experience time as going by faster.  If you find this hard to believe, just think about how time drags on a hot afternoon.  Consider how time doesn't go fast enough when you are bored or uninterested in whatever it is that you are doing.  And then think for a moment about how time literally flies when you are completely absorbed and enjoying a specific activity!

The truth is time does not speed up or slow down. Our perceptions of time passing are simply warped.

If we can accept that we have this inherent flaw in our make-up, we can work to compensate accordingly.  Use a timer to ensure that you do not exceed your allocated time limit when engaging in an activity that you expect will captivate your attention.  Keep clocks in clear visibility – and no, a cellphone does not count! How many times do we look at our cellphone to tell the time only to be distracted by an incoming message or notification?

Although our perceptions of time can make time feel like it is liquid and forever changing, if we remember that this is simply a psychological phenomenon to be conscious of, we can be better time managers and ultimately suffer less stress.

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Will Smith’s After Earth contains a lesson for us all

Now you may or may not be a sci-fi fan.  At the Time Clinic, we’re certainly a huge Will Smith fan.  We loved his Pursuit of Happyness in which his son Jaden Smith first appeared.  His most recent movie, After Earth, sees this talented father and son combo in action yet again in a sci-fi extravaganza.  But why, you may be asking yourself, is a time management specialist blog so excited about a science fiction film?

Well, there’s a very important scene in this film that is very much aligned with our teachings at The Time Clinic.  We’d like to share this quote from Will Smith’s character, General Cipher Rage:

“Fear is not real. The only place that fear can exist is in our thoughts of the future, it is a product of our imagination causing us to fear things that do not at present and may not ever exist. That is near insanity, Kitai. Now do not misunderstand me, danger is very real, but fear is a choice. We are all telling ourselves a story, and that day mine changed.”

Powerful stuff! We couldn’t agree more.  Fear, worries, stress – so many of our negative emotions that weigh us down exist in the future, but are they really real?  How much time do we spend invested in these negative thoughts and emotions? 

But what about the past? We can also get stuck there! The past also holds thoughts and emotions – guilt, regret, sadness.  How much time and emotional energy are you investing in the past?

A moving message to remind us to remember to be ‘present’, for in the present moment, everything really is just fine! So choose to change YOUR story.
As for the movie?  We think it’s a goodie! Go see it, it’s on circuit now! Here’s the official trailer, enjoy!

Everything you ever wanted to know about coffee!

It gets you up in the morning. It tastes great – well to some of us at least.  But how good is coffee for you exactly? Does it really make us more effective?

Coffee is the most widely used and accepted psychoactive drug on the planet! Yes it is a drug, it certainly has psychoactive properties – like cocaine, coffee is a stimulant, but is far more acceptable! How did coffee become so acceptable? Is it really safe? And could it even have health benefits?

Let’s start with the health benefits. Research is indicating that coffee is beneficial in reducing Alzheimers, Diabetes, Parkinsons and risk of gallstones.  Women who drink three cups a day may live longer whilst cirrhosis of the liver, oral, oesophageal, and pharyngeal cancer might be reduced. Coffee can even benefit your heart – but make sure you are drinking instant coffee as the freeze drying process removes the lipids in coffee which can actually be detrimental to your cardio health.  Coffee also acts as a laxative and a diuretic, but because of the diuretic effect we should be drinking one glass of water for every cup of coffee we consume to avoid dehydration.  Coffee is also a powerful antioxidant.  If you rub coffee on to those problem cellulite areas, it can even reduce cellulite, but drinking it may not be so good for the problem in the first place.

Green coffee beans are the new craze, what’s that all about? While most of the beneficial chemicals that we absorb in roasted coffee cannot be absorbed by our bodies when the beans are still green, green coffee beans have their own benefits.  Green coffee beans score as high as 2500 on the ORAC scale Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity – a measurement of the potential for a substance to reduce oxidative stress.  This is pretty impressive when one considers blueberries only scores 10 and oranges about 3. Green coffee doesn’t taste very good, but is believed to assist weight loss whilst lowering blood pressure.

Does coffee really increase our performance?  One or two cups do enhance cognitive function and short term memory, increasing alertness.  Should we drink more than that?  How much caffeine can the body really absorb and are there alternatives?

So far the benefits of drinking coffee are sounding pretty fantastic, but there is a darkside.  So before you increase your daily quota, please do read on.

Homocysteine is a naturally occurring amino acid found in the blood and tissues.  If one suffers from common folic acid deficiency – or more seriously the genetic mutation causing elevated levels of homocysteine, the health risks include heart attack, stroke, cancer, diabetes, parkinsons.. the list goes on.  And coffee is one of the main culprits for increasing homocysteine levels in the blood. Do not exceed one cup a day unless you know your homocysteine is in the clear!

Consumption of coffee has been linked to ulcers and insomnia.  Its effectiveness as a stimulant might also be overrated, after your second cup, your body tends to discard the excess caffeine and it’s more likely to cause problems sleeping than improve your afternoon performance. 

Excessive consumption of coffee and energy drinks containing caffeine has been linked to adrenal fatigue and possibly even chronic fatigue syndrome.  For a healthier alternative, try some green tea which contains far less caffeine, but includes the calming amino acid L-Theanine which simultaneously calms the nervous system and enhances concentration abilities.

Coffee may be great for that initial boost, but we recommend you limit your intake to one to two cups a day and switch to green tea thereafter for sustained energy with a calming effect. It seems coffee is here to stay, and it’s not all bad, so in moderation, you have our full permission to enjoy that morning cuppa!

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