You keep telling yourself to focus on the task at hand, but do you ever consider what staying focused actually means? Sure, it’s concentrating on the task and engaging with it on an active cognitive level. But it also implies reading, assessing, pondering, dissecting, memorizing, and connecting the task to your existing knowledge and finding ways to solve it or apply it to other tasks. Hey … did you just check your phone again?

When dealing with anything that requires concentrated effort, we tend to zone out, disappear into our own thoughts, or respond to the call of social media. The fact is that there is simply too much noise around us, and we’re bound to get distracted more often than not. Let’s think of that noise. It’s not just loud and startling – it’s also the white noise of busy lives, constant online presence, and our long days. Your brain needs rest from many things, which is why it’s so easily lured into the trap of distractions.

The bad news is that the older we get, the more difficult it is to stay focused for extended periods of time. But let’s not despair yet. Just as many ways lead to Rome, there are many ways to stay focused on your tasks.