If you are someone like me who has a hard time focusing, that may be. You might be distracted from your social media, getting too many notifications on your phone, having too many monitors on your desk, or having too many tabs open.

• What I found to be helpful is doing a Pomodoro Technique.
• Where you focus on work for 24 min and then get a 5 min break.
• Having a small timer in front of you helps you focus and have piano music or focus music playing in the background. There is a bunch of playlists out there that you can use.
• The other benefit of having a timer in front of you is that whenever a thought comes to your head that requires you to open up a tab on the browser to see how and ex is doing or google answer to deeper question like what is the meaning of life, you can say to yourself oh I will do that in my 5 mins break.
• You can also download Pomodoro App on your iOS or Android device, and there are a ton of them out there. I am sure you can find them if your search.

Analyzing your Attention Span

When I started timing myself to see how long I could focus, I clocked in about 15 minutes before getting sidetracked. Knowing this allowed me to set my work sessions for 15 mins intervals and 5 mins break to answer sudden urges from my mind, including bathroom breaks.

At the same time, I was trying to increase my attention span, from 15 to 16 mins, from 16 to 17 mins, etc.

With that said, people like me, and when saying people like me, I mean, as someone who has roles as head of growth or retention, our whole career is built on making sure you get addicted to our apps and have drawl symptoms. But sadly, I am not immune to this either, but there are things you can do to make sure you are focused on your work.

Have a clean workspace or desk setup.

• The more you own, the more those things will hold you.
• Buy things that free your time and make your life more productive.
• Remove everything from your desk beside the essentials. For some like me, it is one large screen monitor, Laptop Docking Station, Keyboard, Mouse and mouse pad, Speakers, and pencil holder for my desk, and that is it. Everything else is out of sight and out of mind.

Don't have more than one Monitor.

• Now I know what you might be thinking, oh Timur, but I need more than one screen if I have to reference something while working the constant back forth between tabs is not productive. That is why I need two monitors for that say.
• There are plenty own options out there for you to have widescreen monitors that allow you to open more than one Tab at a time.
• I use Samsung G9, which will be overkill for most people.

Have a Clean Desktop Screen

• That means you need to clean up your Desktop from all the icons. Usually, I would suggest putting everything in its proper folder and naming them appropriately.
• I would also suggest doing a monthly clean-up of all desktops, where you remove unwanted files, pictures, and screenshots.
• But if you want a quick solution that I have used in the past, create a New Folder on your Desktop and, naming it "All," drag and drop every file, folder, screenshot into that folder.

At night put your phone on Focus mode. Sleep mode iPhone has this function.

• Having an apple watch can be a double-edged sword on the one hand. It will limit your time on your phone if you tend to look at urgent notifications. On the other hand, having too many messages can distract you if you are working and in the zone.

Remove Social Media Apps from your phone.

• You might say, " Oh, Timur, I might miss out on important news if you use social media to consume your information. Trust me, you won't, and if there is something worth hearing, you will hear about it.
• When Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Awards, I heard about it without the help of social media.
• Timur, what if I want to share something on Instagram or Facebook to build my brand? Great Question. I usually download the app, upload what I want to share, and delete it immediately. And then, I will use the web version of the app to monitor the comments and like just in case something urgent comes up.
• This might also help remove your anxiety; now, I am not saying this is the only thing. You will start seeing improvements, you will stop comparing yourself to others and focus on what is important to you, and you stick with working on yourself long enough, you will come to find you have outgrown most of the people you followed.
• Just because you are friends with people on social media does not mean you have to see their stories, have the stuff appear on your feed or wall, and start muting people; you don't need to keep up with their lives.

Add the Chrome Extension Unhooked.

• This allows you only to show channels that you are only subscribed to, keeps you from being sucked into youtube's recommendation black hole, and after a few hours, leaves you wondering where did all that time go.
• The one recommended is Unhooked if you can find others to use that.

Add Site Blocker Chrome Extension.

• Start blocking out Facebook, Instagram, etc.
• Something remarkable might happen you will catch yourself opening tabs to a website that sucks your time without even realizing it.
• I use AdBlock Plus, but I am sure you can find others.

Start implementing these things. Start small, and you will see a considerable improvement. For example, start by setting a timer and putting it in front of you the next time you work.

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