4 Techniques to Develop Focus and Discipline

I’ll not lie to you. I’m a big slacker. And, I get distracted easily.

I find it difficult to show up at the desk. When I show up, the challenge is to focus.

There are hundreds of tricks to accomplish this, but we’ll be talking about the approach of presence and mindfulness.

I’ve read these techniques in the book The Practicing Mind: Developing Focus and Discipline in Your Life Master Any Skill or Challenge by Learning to Love the Process by Thomas M. Sterner.

These techniques will help you make the boring work interesting.

Keep it simple

Don’t over-complicate the tasks or the process.

The more complicated you make it, the more mental fatigue you’ll have. If you have goals too far beyond your reach, you’ll start doubting yourself. You’ll feel overwhelmed and tired just thinking of it.

Simplify the tasks

One step at a time

Break down the bigger goals into smaller chunks.

Break the tasks in a way that’s enough to keep you interested and focused. This applies to your creative work, professional work, and to boring day to day stuff too like cleaning the garage.

The thing is, when you see it’s too much work, your brain goes “errr I’ll do this later.” So when you break the task, this reduces the feeling of overwhelm. and makes it easier to accomplish.

Dedicate a short amount of time

Let’s talk about cleaning your garage. How much time do you think it might take? A day? Maybe. Why not give 45 minutes every day for a couple of days? And, you’re done.

Focus on a task for a short time. When you promise yourself to focus for short while, there is no frustration involved. You feel in control for that amount of time.

Slow down your process

When I read about this trick, it came off as the weirdest of them all. But it makes a lot of sense when you try it out.

Deliberately slowing your work and doing it at the pace you’re most comfortable with puts your brain in focus mode. You achieve more than you would do with less focus and faster speed.

I get it, you’re being a little resistant about the idea of being slow.

Let me elaborate…

Let’s take the same example of cleaning the garage.

You set the timer to 45 minutes and you have decided on a small goal for the day. Now, you’re intentionally going slow at this.

You’re taking your time to clean every minute part that’s coming across. You want to rush with this and get over with it. But you slow down.

As you slow down, your brain starts to go “He is going slow at this. This must be something I enjoy.” It tricks your mind in enjoying the process.

And when you go slow, you are completely present in the moment, you have the gift of presence that we spoke about earlier. And when you’re present you complete things faster, and you develop focus.

I’ve got two big-time authors, to back me up on this…
One is obviously the author of the book The Practicing Mind, the one I’ve been sharing insights from, Thomas M. Sterner. The second, author of the book Stillness is The Key, Ryan Holiday.

Which one of these tricks did you find most interesting? Please let me know.

- Noman Shaikh