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In today’s world where distractions are everywhere, our ability to focus has become a scarce commodity.
Everything seems like a great idea—everything except the very thing we should be doing.
Dopamine gives us the desire to take action to earn the exciting reward that’s waiting for us. It is the force that makes us act.
Contrary to what many people believe, dopamine is not a pleasure chemical. Simply because an event triggers the release of dopamine doesn’t mean it is something we like or get pleasure from. In fact, when you pay close attention, you’ll notice that as soon as you obtain the expected reward, you’ll often feel empty and unfulfilled.
Under such a state of stimulation, any task that requires concentration becomes much harder to perform. As a result, you will procrastinate. You delay writing that book you’ve always planned. You put off starting that new venture, or you’ll postpone that key project you’re in charge of.
To sum up, from an evolutionary perspective, dopamine’s role is to encourage you to act to earn the anticipated reward needed for your survival or reproduction.
Unfortunately, in today’s world, the process has been hijacked, which leads to many unintended consequences, as w...
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By continuously triggering the release of dopamine through different means—such as drug or alcohol consumption—addicts actually strengthen their tolerance to such stimulation. As a result, they need stronger and stronger stimulus to experience the same sensation of pleasure.
many activities can become somewhat addictive, for example: Gambling Sex Shopping Thoughts/rumination Video games Exercise (to extreme) Work
Your focus is a scarce asset, which is why marketers spend billions of dollars to attract your attention.
Remember, dopamine is not a pleasure chemical; it is a neurotransmitter that is activated when you anticipate a potential pleasure.
And that pleasure is usually temporary.
Whoever has succeeded in staying away from the internet or social media for a few days, understands what a waste of time and focus such activities can be.,
Dopamine and constant stimulation can impair your ability to think long term
Studies have shown that one of the best predictors of success is the ability to think long term. People who repeatedly focus on where they want to be in the future, make better decisions in the present.
long-time perspective, “was the most important determinant of financial and personal success in life.”
He defined “long-time” as the “ability to think several years into the future while making decisions in the present.”
I believe that social media, and the internet as a whole, have negatively impacted our ability to both think long-term and to focus deeply on the task in front of us.
Apple CEO, Steve Jobs, prohibited his children from using phones or tablets—even though his business was to sell millions of them to his customers!
The billionaire investor and former senior executive at Facebook, Chamath Palihapitiya, argues that we must rewire our brain to focus on the long term, which starts ...
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And, in this frenetic race, we forget one of the most important values of all: patience.
The point is, to achieve long-term goals in your personal or professional life, you must regain control of your attention and rewire your brain to focus on the long term.
Build the foundations for success one brick at a time. Build them strong so that they won’t collapse at the first obstacle or setback.
Remember, long-term thinking is the “secret” to achieving your goals.
When you are calm and focused, doing your main work can be surprisingly easy.
You let interruptions kill your focus and you waste hours checking your emails, visiting social media sites or watching one “educational” video after another.
You’ll ask yourself, why work on my book, write a report or create a marketing plan when I could be doing something far more exciting?
As soon as you enter a state of overstimulation, your mind will play tricks on you to convince you there is no need to leave that “trance”. Instead, your mind encourages you to embrace it and seek even more stimulation.
your mind plays on you to keep you overstimulated.
Trick #1—returning to work is easy
Trick #2—you can do it later
Trick #3—excitement is not the same thing as fulfillment
Excitement can be fun, but make sure you work on developing an inner sense of peace and a heightened state of focus.
Trick #4—you’re missing out
Awareness will help as you start to work on lowering your level of stimulation and becoming more focused on your goals.
What is dopamine detox?
The reduction of stimulation to prevent overstimulation and put you in the proper state of mind to tackle major tasks.
A dopamine detox helps reduce stimulation, thereby allowing you to revert to a more natural state.
When you need less stimulation, seemingly challenging, boring or tedious tasks will become more appealing—and easier to tackle.
you need to remove the following things from your life for 48 hours: Drug/alcohol consumption, Exercising, Internet, Movies, Music (except perhaps for relaxation music), Phone, Social media, Sugar/processed foods, and Video games.
what should I be doing instead? Here are some suggestions: Going for a contemplative walk, Journaling, Meditating/relaxing, Practicing awareness exercises, Reading (except stimulating read perhaps), and Stretching exercises.
The 24-hour dopamine detox
The partial dopamine detox
It entails removing your biggest source of stimulation.
Usually, one specific activity acts as your greatest distraction. For instance, for me, it is YouTube.
If I stopped doing only one thing, which one would increase my focus and boost my productivity the most dramatically? What other activity do I need to avoid in order to help me increase my focus most significantly?
Look at the habits or activities you want to eliminate and ask yourself how you could add friction—the more friction, the better.
Conversely, make your desired behaviors as frictionless as possible.
How could you add friction to eliminate unwanted behaviors? Look at your list of “Can’ts”. Next to each of them, write down specific things you could do to add friction. Then, look at your list of “Cans” and write down things you
could do to eliminate friction.
