How many of us have gone to School and pledged to be more productive today than yesterday? Yet somehow, it always ends up the same – the end of the day rolls around and you are yet to complete the day’s assignment, sometimes at night, you give yourself a milestone to reach, either to study for 2 hours but unfortunately, an entertainment show, Project Fame is ongoing and you suddenly brought your plans to an abrupt end.
I have been asking this a while ago, ‘Why are we so unproductive?’ To a large extent, I have been receiving perceived reasons such as the challenges of digitization leading to Information overload and the glut of digital interfaces. The different gadgets we now have which were supposed to make us productive have now has provided us with unintended consequences. It has posed to be a great distraction to us.
Students now encounter unnecessary interruptions during studies form the various Social Networking apps in operation on their smart phones such as the Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp to mention a few, although they are highly beneficial but students have rather abused them by spending most of their time aimlessly on this platforms. It is however important to reduce distractions, and consequently find times when you can avoid electronic distractions entirely to focus on your study.
It is crystal clear that studying is tough enough in itself; however, studying over the loud conversation of others or amidst the screams of your colleagues can often be next to impossible. Obviously, the best advice for dealing with distractions while studying is to find a way to be alone in a quiet place. Because this ideal situation is sometime impossible to achieve, you need some tools to help you tune out noise and tune into your studies. Read further to learn about how to deal with distractions:
Prioritize: Prioritise your daily tasks in order of importance like it is described in Economics, do prioritise on the scale of preference. Major on the Major and Minor on the Minor, Don’t make the mistake of Majoring on the minor, your productivity will outrightly diminish and vice versa. Like Brian Tracy advised, take 5-10 minutes daily to plan your activities for the day, you can save yourself of a day of stress that way.
Don’t procrastinate:: Procrastination is simply dragging your feet because you don’t want to do something. In the final analysis, your reasons for doing so don’t matter; if you procrastinate for any reason, the result is lost productivity. The solution is to force yourself to work: visualize what you need to do, break it down into smaller tasks that are easier to handle, and then buckle down and get it done. Easier said than done, perhaps, but it’s just as necessary to push through procrastination as it is to jettison perfectionism. Get to work!
Eliminate distractions around you: Interruptions that social networks bring upon you can be limited when you take out the source of such distractions. Your phone is the major source of distractions caused by social networking. When you need to concentrate on your study based on your prioritization, it is essential for you to take away your phone and place it beyond reach.
The bottom line is there is a need to create boundaries for using time-saving digital technologies. Get away from things that deny you total concentration on your studies. It will be of huge benefit to you eventually.
