Ah, the old problem that really is a worldwide problem for every creative person everywhere, but let’s just pretend this is only writers.
I don’t know many, if any, writers who don’t suffer from a ‘squirrelly brain’ on occasion. Even in moments of absolute deadline and the need to focus, you kind of click off when something catches your eye or a thought travels across the brain pan and goes ‘Oi…I really think we should think about what life was like for a cobbler in Ancient Rome’ (just me? I thought not). As much as I like to claim that these are flashes of brilliance that prove, once again, how smart I am, the reality is somewhat less positive. Sadly.
(Note: Now, if you have ADHD or a different condition that affects concentration (ie. depression), this is a more complex situation. Therapy and exercises do help but aren’t a cure-all. What predispositions I have… I’ve had to really fight against and not always successfully. This generally refers to how I am when I am healthier in my mental state.)
Why do we get distracted?
The problem is, the brain is wired to be distracted. Consider a 2009 article from Psychology Today regarding this problem where it was actively studied by MIT neuroscientists presents this look at the issue:
“Trey Hedden and John Gabrieli, two neuroscientists from MIT, studied what happens in the brain when people are distracted by internal thoughts when doing difficult tasks. They found that lapses in attention impair performance, independent of what the task is, and that these lapses in attention involve activating the medial prefrontal cortex. The medial prefrontal cortex is located within the prefrontal cortex itself, around the middle of your forehead. It activates when you think about yourself and other people. This region of the brain is also part of what is called the “default” network. This network becomes active when you are not doing much at all, such as being in between activities while in a scanner. Hedden and Gabrieli found that when you lose external focus, this default brain network activates and your attention goes to more internal signals, such as being more aware of something that may be bothering you.” (1)
In my bad sum up…our brain is a bit of a bitch.
Not like a bad bitch but still…bitchy.
We get distracted all the time and sometimes to our detriment. Who hasn’t had a meeting with a higher-up (or hell…you ARE the higher-up) and zoned out so completely that when they ask if you agree you blindly nod and smile and say ‘Sure’? Gosh, been there. Hate it. Let’s not do that again because I was mortified each time. What is worse is when someone thinks to quiz you on it later, innocently or not, and you have to tell an intricate lie to pretend you know what is going on.
There is a school of thought that the reason why we let ourselves lose focus is because the situation just doesn’t matter to us enough but I don’t think that is accurate. We all do this, even during important situations such as driving through rush hour or making sure the milk in your cereal doesn’t overflow and seep on the counter or you put OJ in your oatmeal (…I’m projecting again…). A complex problem like this isn’t a matter of willpower and I don’t know if humans are capable of overcoming much through strength of will alone. We’re not really wired that way, in my humble opinion. We’re wired to a.) find the path of least resistance and b.) avoid pain. And willpower alone is part of a painful process.
Think about it. You have been, say, trying to write that last chapter or another blog post. You know it has to get done. But as much as you grunt and grind and grumble and curse and anything else that gets your odd work ethic staggering around, nothing seems to happen. You get distracted and you lose it. Or, even if you do do what you have to do, you just can’t make yourself do it to the level you want it to be at.
Why is focus important to writers?
I’m not sure it is. All the time anyway.
I KNOW. How contradictory of me. I feel like a philosopher. Plato would be rolling in his grave if his body hasn’t long since turned to dust.
The thing is…writers…well, we’re an oddly moody bunch on the whole. Given to daydreams, nightmares, moodiness, depression, exaltation…we love and hate our own changeability. I know someone out there is going NOT ME NAHA, but come on, gorgeous. You’re lying. You can’t tell me you haven’t sat and daydreamed a chunk of your life away dreaming up book plots and going ‘damn that’s such a good idea I could give Dickens a run for his money and wallow like Scrooge McDuck in gold coins for a while’. Don’t lie. I mean we’re writers. We lie all the time. But in this situation, don’t sit to the side and sniff and go ‘not me’. You’re not important enough. I’m not important enough.
An important factor in the overall grumpiness/moodiness/daydreaming is that it actually feeds us. Those daydreams warp from a mere thought to a quote to a character to a scene to a world to a story to a…you get me. It breeds and multiplies. Plot bunnies beget plot bunnies and duplicate faster than bacteria. And that is amazing. When an author gets asked ‘Where do you get your ideas?’, they typically smile and say some platitude while inwardly screaming ‘I HAVE NO FUCKING IDEA’. I mean, I suppose we could use the suggestion that it is because we’ve read something that sparked our brain, which then combined it with another thought and another idea, to a beautiful lump of creative juiciness, butttttt….
Screaming ‘I HAVE NO FUCKING IDEA’ is more fun.
But that odd meandering way to an idea has very little to do with actual focus. It is because the brain is wandering that we get our ideas. From PsychMechanics, this quote hits hard: “As you let your mind wander, you combine and recombine ideas. It is likely that a new thought generated by this process connects with the solution of your subconscious giving you a light bulb or a stroke of insight.” (2)
Letting your mind wander tends to (in my case) restart a sense of what is possible. I suck, absolutely suck, at trying to think of an entire story from start to finish off the cuff if I am in focus mode. I can do it for ad campaigns and ghostwriting off outlines, sure, that’s part of my job, but for myself? I need to let the mind really wander. I go for walks, paint, read history books, whatever. Daydreaming and unusual methods of thinking help our creative process and in no way should be stifled.
Unless, of course, you are experiencing Maladaptive Daydreaming, in which you might need to get that checked out.
Okay, letting our mind wander is good, so why bother to focus?
Eh, I know someone is thinking this. Likely wanting to comment and grumble about it. Fiiiiiine. Let me get from under my toadstool of dreams and hop on the focus wagon for a bit.
The reason why we need to focus is because it is very easy for daydreaming and the like to turn to not doing the thing at all, or doing it very poorly. Our writing wanders way away from the plot. Our characters decide to go walking or our setting goes from Ancient Rome to modern Detroit in a way that makes actually little sense. We get lost imagining ourselves elsewhere, as other people even, and next thing we know, we’re long gone, the hour’s up and we have done nothing.
Fundamentally frustrating.
(I really like writing that phrase, just fyi)
Focus is needed to really get our best work done without waffling about actually doing the damn work. ‘Deep Work’, coined by Cal Newport in his book Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World (2016), is the reference to studying for focused chunks of time. And this applies to writing. You can have your daydream schedule but you need to have the discipline to sit down and do something about what you are dreaming about. I recommend that book to anyone looking to get their work done and it lays out a good groundwork to follow.
The problem many of modern writers is that we struggle to do it all. We want to do it all. Modern publishing requires writers to be all the things instead of just writers (unless you are very lucky and get a big contract that lets you sit absent from the world and fart rainbows that turn into stories). You could outsource the other things, sure. But many people are not so lucky, due to budget, location, type of work, etc. Learning to write well and consistently is important above all but thanks to how things are on the market you get yanked into having to learn social media, fan handling, marketing, covers, etc. Oh and be sure to check your rankings and your royalties and your fanbase and write a newsletter and look into speaking at conventions and what about that course you wanted to try to learn how to actually make sense of Amazon and Facebook ads?
Gosh, I’m exhausted just reading that list. No wonder I have fatigue issues.
What can we do to improve our focus as writers?
Everyone is different.
But here. I can offer up my hacks. You’re going to have your own that you find (when chips are down, you will find them) because what works for me might not work for you.
Get the right sound
I love MyNoise https://mynoise.net/
MyNoise is run by Stéphane Pigeon, who works so hard to bring this to life. It is glorious. I can’t recall how I found it. It has generators for all kinds of sounds, from a bustling cafe to a quiet office to the seaside of Ireland. My favourite is the Cafe Restaurant Generator. I used to love writing in cafes prior to the pandemic and now, as my health is iffy, I find going out exhausting at the moment. But the generator allows me to get that low hum that I need. When I worked in an office, I used the generator (they thought I was listening to music but honestly I used this to tune out incessant chatter) to help me keep my anxiety low and to focus. You can adjust your levels of chatter, clatter, hum, etc. As the site explains, background chatter isn’t great for us when it is decipherable. That means that if you can pick out words you will try to listen in. Likely this is a throwback to our wild days. I really recommend that if it works out, for you to donate to the project for lifetime access and to help maintain it.
Another source I like is Nemo’s Dreamscapes on Youtube. Combining themes with beautiful animations and soft music, usually from eras long past, it can help your brain zero in. A thing that I have noticed is that modern music is very…loud. It feels like someone is shouting at times. That distracts the hell out of me. But setting soft sounds and music to background hum keeps me focussed. Run by a friendly admin, you can get long stretches (some over 11 hours) and just work away.
Time yourself
If you know me, you know I love the Pomodoro™ Technique. Developed by Francesco Cirillo in the 1980s, Pomodoro™ Technique is a time management method that uses a timer to break down your work into intervals. You set a to-do list and work in 25 minute intervals. After your interval of 25 minutes is done, you can take a break for 5 or 10 minutes to rest your mind, then move back into another interval. It helps increase productivity without stressing you out.
So much so that I use a plugin called Tomato Clock on Firefox to use it when at my computer. Here’s a nifty site if you’re on desktop: http://www.tomatotimers.com/ . Apps aside, as Mr. Cirillo advocates, you can get a simple cooking timer, wind it to 25 minutes, and then go. The winding up helps you feel geared up to go, the ticking adds to your need to finish, and the ringing makes you feel accomplished. When I work on art or handwriting or my typewriter, I use an egg timer. It definitely helps.
Set Your Schedule
So this…is tricky. Because we never really do much that works on schedule. I had an occupational therapist insist I needed a schedule but my life/health makes it nearly impossible to have the same schedule in and out day after day. But you can absolutely set a schedule if you know that will help. Being able to close your door, lockdown your work, turn off your phone, for a set time every day will help you. The trick is to not be so stringent that you became overcome and angry when it gets messed with. Life happens.
I don’t really have any apps to recommend for this (feel free to leave a comment with one) as I just use my Filofax that I check daily. You need to have your notification/task list/whatever in front of where you can see it. You could set an alarm on your phone or book your digital calendar a week in advance. Do what you have to do to make scheduling work
Remove Social Media
I think I heard some people gasp and flinch. But here’s the thing. Social media is designed in a slot machine function to gain and retain your attention. Think about it. Every time your phone dings or buzzes, you get an alert and your dopamine centres get fired up with excitement:
“Part of what makes the internet and its messages so attractive to your dopamine systems is that it’s unpredictable. Dopamine is stimulated by uncertainty; not knowing everything. So, when we get an alert on our phone, we’re unsure. It could be anything, a text, e-mail, a reply on Twitter or a Facebook message, we don’t know until we check it out nor do we know who’s it from or what it’s about. Dopamine loves that.” (Schneider, 2015).3
If you look at social media, it makes our interactions into a game. Our brains love games. The problem is that we get an almost Pavlovian response to that ding or notification slide. And that can really mess with your focus. I removed social media apps, blocked them on desktop, and put my accounts on dark mode. The most I do is use a scheduler to put a post up so I don’t actively go on it. If someone wants to contact me, email or phone works. The change was big. Suddenly I had all the time I never thought I had before.
Now, I am not advocating you do this if you don’t want to. Not all of us are the same. Some people can take or leave social media. I used to be a social media manager so I get the need to be on all the time if you are in that camp. But you need to take yourself off it to focus properly on your work without falling into the ever dreaded ‘doom-scroll’.
Use a site blocker such as LeechBlock or Self-Control to keep yourself off a site for a set amount of time and turn off notifications temporarily on your phone. You can set your Android or iPhone to let in only certain calls and not to use notifications (you can always turn them back on). You need to have your focus back and this part isn’t fun at times because we’ve become attached to our phones and instant gratification lifestyle. But follow the path of many great writers and learn that you can pull away from social media and phones for a block of time. The world likely won’t end.
Is there an easy way to focus?
Alas, no. Focus and flow are not easy to get into. But when you do get into it, you will find it easier to come to again and again. It takes practice and discipline. Sitting your butt in a chair does you no good if you don’t have yourself set up for success. By giving your brain some creative space to think and create, you may find it gets easier to access that special zone you get into when you are working.
If you struggle with it, remember that this is not a race. We all take our different pathways to getting our work done. You can work in your own time and against your own gremlins. Take the wins when you can get them, and when you can’t hit your level of focus like you want, you can shrug and say ‘We’ll get ’em next time’. Just remember: what you do to help yourself will keep your stress levels low and allow you to create in an unencumbered way.
References:
1- Rock, D. (2009, October 4) “Easily Distracted? Why it can be so hard to focus.” Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/your-brain-work/200910/easily-distracted
2- Parvez, Hanan (2021, February 20) Why do we daydream? (Explained).
PsychMechanics. https://www.psychmechanics.com/why-do-we-daydream-psychology-of/
3.- Schneider, Rebecca (2015, September 15). What’s the Science Behind Social Media Addiction?SiOWfa15: Science in Our World: Certainty and Controversy. https://sites.psu.edu/siowfa15/2015/09/15/whats-the-science-behind-social-media-addiction/
Image References:
Rita, S. (2019). Girl, Woman, Youthful Learn to Read [Image]. In Pixabay. https://pixabay.com/photos/girl-woman-youthful-to-learn-read-4118036/