#005 - Are You Feeling Distracted and Unfocused?

Are you feeling distracted and want to be more focused and get more done in your writing, publishing, and marketing? If so, I'm going to share a few tips with you in this hits Blitz episode. My name is Shelly Hitz, and I want to tell you this is a thing that we all deal with. Most recently on one of our calls for Christian Book Academy, many of our members were chiming in and saying that they're struggling with distraction and with focus. And so I wanted to record this episode to just give you a few tips on things that you can do and just help you in this culture that we live. Because, number one, the technology is a huge distraction. We are always bombarded with so many things. With different notifications on our phones, our computers, our iPads, everything. We're just being bombarded. And then since COVID I mean, it's just been a harder time. Our buckets are more full with water, and so anything extra, it's like, it's easy for it to overflow, and it's just easier to feel overwhelmed, distracted, unfocused, and not move forward in God's call to write, publish, and market your books. And so if you're feeling distracted, the first thing I want you to really ask yourself is, what. What is the primary thing that distracts me? And it could be multiple things, but you probably know, it could be that your text messages are going off all the time. Maybe you're part of some big group texts and, you know, just different things. Um, it could be your social media. I know for me, it tends to be social media that can distract me. It might be email, it might be people like, you know, people just are wanting your time and asking you to run errands and do things for them. And maybe there's some boundaries that need to be set, but typically with distractions, there are some boundaries that need to be set. Maybe instead of checking into social media all the time, when those notifications come up, maybe you turn off the notifications and then you choose a certain time to go in and check your social media. That's what I do. And honestly, I've actually removed all the social media apps from. From my phone. I'm logged out on all my browsers, on my phone. And so that's something that I have done to set that boundary and to help me to be more focused. Could you let your family and friends know that you're going to be writing for a certain amount of time and you won't be replying to text messages? I mean, there are so many things that we can do with that. And it's a whole other training. I mean, I have shared hours and hours of training on this. If you're interested in more, just let me know. I do have some stuff that I've done, done on this in the past. But the other thing I really think is one of the primary issues is prioritizing your tasks, your projects, your to do list. And instead of just going by tyranny of the urgent or whatever pops up in your feed that day, or whatever email you get, or whatever thing is going on in Christian Book Academy, for instance, you might get distracted by all the things that we have going. But you know, instead of just going with the flow, I want you to really ask God, what is the priority for today? And the priority for today it might be prayer and fasting, you know, it might, it might be something that you don't expect and just ask him, lord, what is the priority for today? But I've gotten really, really good at this through the years and I'll look at my to do list and I'll okay, what are the top priorities? What needs to get done now? And for me, because I do this full time and we pay our bills by, you know, our business, I have to look at like, what are the top priorities for what's going to bring in revenue for our business? And then for my marketing and everything, I always focus on what can help build my email list. You know, those are things that I'm always looking at. But there might be other things that are time based. So I know that I'm going to be participating in a bundle or a summit or something, a collaboration. And so I know that there's due dates and I know that there's certain things that need done for that. So you know, there's different ways to prioritize. But I would say that every day I am looking over my, my to do list and I'm prioritizing. There are things that then I push down the list, maybe until tomorrow or next week. There are other things that I just decide to delete from the list. And I am constantly, constantly prioritizing what is the most important task for today. So if you're trying to get your book finished, guess what your priority needs to be? It needs to be getting your butt in the chair and writing. Whether that's pen and paper, whether that's dictation, whether that's recording an audio to be transcribed, whether that's typing, it can look a lot of different ways. But, but at the end of the day, you Just need to get that time doing more research, doing more, you know, watching more training videos, you know, going to more Facebook groups to learn about writing. You know, those things are all good, but at the end of the day, if you're not actually writing, you're not gonna move forward. And so that is your priority. Do that first. You know, it's like Stephen Covey talked about the three big rocks. And if you have a jar, you fill it with sand, you fill it with rice, then you have three rocks. By the time the sand and the rice get in there, the three rocks won't fit. But if you put the three rocks in first, then put in the rice, the next biggest thing, then put in the sand, everything will fit. So we have to be constantly asking the Lord, what are my three big rocks today? And it might be only one rock or it might be five rocks, but what are my main rocks for today? What do I need to get done for first? I am constantly prioritizing and looking at my list that way. So that is something. But then also we just need to sometimes turn everything off and get into the zone. So what do I mean? There's a book by Cal Newport, if you've been following me, you've heard me talk about it many times. It's called Deep Work. And he talks about this. And this is basically the concept we use in our monthly virtual writing retreats that we do for Christian Book Academy members. We do it in typically the last Friday and Saturday of the month, and we use the Pomodoro method. And basically, even in Cal Newport's research, he found that two hours of Deep Work is about the right time. So we typically will go 50 minutes and then take a 10 minute break on our virtual writing retreats. You could also do 25 minutes, then take a five minute break. But the key to this and the key to getting more focus is to turn everything else off. So you've already prioritized. You already know what is your one thing that you need to be getting done right now. What are your big rocks? So then you choose one and you focus on that until it's done, or you focus on that until you get to a new place with that, you're not flitting around between tasks. You're not moving around between Facebook and Instagram and email, and you're focused. You're turning off all of those things and you're focusing on one task. And that task should be the priority task, the task that God has led you to do for that day. And that has Been a game changer for me then. Cal Newport says pretty much the brain shuts down after four hours of deep work. Not shuts down completely, but you're just not gonna get as much done. And so after you've done four hours of deep work, then take a longer break or do some of the other little things like checking into social media, checking into Christian Book Academy, watching a training, you know, give yourself a chance to do those things, but do it after you've done your deep work. And if you're working a full time job, and I know a lot of you are, then maybe you can't do two hours of deep work. Maybe you can do 15 minutes of deep work. During that 15 minutes, turn off everything else. Focus on one thing. That is the key. You're turning off the distractions and you're turning your focus to one thing. And so I really think that if you would really put this to action, whatever time you do have, whether it's 15 minutes or if you can do it two hours a day or even four hours a day, I do this full time. And when I really set myself up to do four hours of deep work, I get a lot done. I mean, it's amazing. My husband's always like, what? Shelly, you can get more done in four hours than most people can get done in two weeks. But it's, it's just, I've trained my brain and I really believe God has helped to heal my brain. Because in 2017, I think there's a blog post back somewhere on my blog about it. Training authors.com, but I had a burnout, a burnout. And I was. My brain was not in a good place and I was not getting, I was not as productive as I used to be and I had to retrain my brain and I had to do this. So I've been doing this now for five years and now it's, it's still hard at times. I still don't always want to do it. I, I still can get distracted, but I've trained my brain and it's really helped me to develop the focus and the productivity. And so I just want to encourage you, if you're struggling right now with distraction and with focus, try these things. First of all, identify what is your biggest distraction and is there something you can do to change that? Second of all, prioritize your tasks. Ask God, what is my priority task today? What are my big rocks to do first? Get those done first and then do the other things. Brian Tracy also has a book called eat the frog. And he talks about do the big thing that you're dreading, the thing that you're resisting the most. Do that first and then do the things that feel fun or feel easy later. And then third, learn how to do deep work. And if you want to really practice this, I encourage you to join us for our virtual writing retreats in Christian Book Academy. We have them once a month, two days. We have it on a Friday and a Saturday. So even if you work, you can come on a Saturday. But join us, you know, join us for these. If you're not yet a member, join us@christianbookacademy.com it will help you to develop this habit of deep work. But when you're, when you're attending those and when you're doing it, make sure you're turning off all the other distractions and focusing on one thing. So I hope that this was helpful for you. I know I could talk a long time on this, but I just wanted to give you just a few tips to get you started and I will talk to you on the next episode of Hit Splits.