"Scott...  Scott...  Hello, Scott"

Suddenly jerked from my daydream, I finally respond, "I'm sorry, you were saying?..."

It happens to everyone of us from time to time. We "zone out", daydream, go into the staring stage. Essentially, we lose focus in the moment. I suppose it's quite acceptable now and then. But for those of us pursuing the fullest expression of our unique, God-given design, focus is a must.

Excellence is being focused. Focus is being excellent. When you focus deeply on the task at hand, you express your unique design right there and then. So what is focus?

Cal Newport, in his book, Deep Work, explains it pretty well:

"Deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task. It’s a skill that allows you to quickly master complicated information and produce better results in less time. Deep work will make you better at what you do and provide the sense of true fulfillment that comes from craftsmanship. In short, deep work is like a super power in our increasingly competitive twenty-first century economy."

And yet, there is a tremendous shortage of deep work. "...most people have lost the ability to go deep," says Newport, "spending their days instead in a frantic blur of e-mail and social media, not even realizing there’s a better way."

If you want to be mediocre, refrain from deep work. Stay away from focus. If you want to be excellent, deep work and focus is a staple discipline.

Nina Semczuk wrote about 5 practices of deep work in her article on Medium. They are:

1. Distance yourself from social media.
2. Give yourself a strict period of time to spend working.
3. Use commutes, exercise, cleaning or other repetitive tasks to work out concepts.
4. Prioritize with the 4DX Framework.
5. Notice your shallow work to better avoid it.

Read her full article as she goes deep (no pun intended) on each of the 5 practices. I want to focus on what I believe is the bane of excellence: social media.

Distance yourself from social media. How often do you check your notifications on your mobile? I bet you do it quite frequently. Those little red numbers in the upper right corner of the apps are taunting you saying, "Open me up, I've got something new for you!" And what about the "ding!" that you hear as each email message or text or... you name it hits your phone?

Here's the most destructive thing. Even when you don't hear it, you have trained your brain to be on the lookout for it. So you are never really in the moment at any point. So when you separate yourself from all of it, your brain can relax.

Social media lulls us into mediocrity

and distances us from any chance

of becoming excellent.

The Social Dilemma is a movie that is quite eye-opening. It reveals that when you engage on a free platform, YOU become the product. Every like, follow, article read, etc. you make you are telling the system what you want to see more of. On the surface, this sounds reasonable. But it's killing excellence. First, because you want to be validated, every thing you end up seeing is what you agree with. That's intoxicating. Second, because you're getting what you like in your newsfeed, you aren't able to engage in deep work like suspending judgment, looking at opposing views with an open mind.

If you're serious about becoming the fullest extent of your unique, God-given design, you will have to beat social media.

ACTION STEP

• Create your own personal "Deep Zone".
• Put a time on the calendar for a daily appointment in your "DZ" for the express purpose of reflecting on life.
• This space must be free of all distractions. Every mobile, tablet, laptop, etc. must be turned off and in a completely different room. *by the way, turn them all off. The physical act of doing so signals to your brain that you're serious about your DZ)
• Start with 10 minutes and build from there. I suggest getting to at least 30 minutes in the morning and evening.

Are you interested in joining me in a 4-week challenge? Email me and reference this blog post.

photo cred