How To Achieve a Zen Like Focus

Editor note: this is a guest post by Anthony from feint.me.

These days, the idea of staying truly focused on any given task seems increasingly difficult. What with Twitter, RSS readers, IM clients and of course email, our lives are filled with constant distractions, engaging us in a battle for focus and productivity.

We can’t take focus for granted. It’s not something that just happens. And unless we’re consciously aware that we need to shine a spotlight on the current task and block out distractions, you can pretty much forget about being productive.

No matter what productivity system or methods you use, the concept of focus will be at the core of your success. For the past few months, I’ve been playing around and hacking with different ideas, body hacks and exercise in an attempt to achieve a Zen like state of focus.

I’ve put my ideas into the following 3 steps. After an hour or so of procrastination before work, when I feel the need to begin a task, I use this method to switch from procrastination into a heightened state of alertness and focus. Here goes:

1 – Step Away

Before diving into a task, its important to give your mind a quick rest. I take a micro break, by stepping away from my desk and taking a quick walk. It’s only 5 minutes, but this is enough to form a physical and physiological barrier between the procrastination and working.

2- Breathing exercise

Now you can move onto taking 5 – 30 really big deep breaths, making sure you concentrate on each breath. The 5 breaths, are not only good for you but will further help your mind release. Let your mind wander and prepare yourself for the following step of..

3 – Concentrate on the Now (mind control)

In order to focus on a task you can’t be rehashing old regrets or future dreams. You need to let all of that go and focus only on the task at hand. Visualise what you’re attempting to achieve the what the finished product will be. I literally spend no more than 10 seconds visualising this. This ability to focus on the “now” is a valuable tool to have up your sleeve. I see it repeated again and again, as an important part of what makes someone successful. Well worth adding this mind control technique to your arsenal.

What just happened.

Lets take a look at what we’ve done so far. We’ve stood up and taken a micro-break, which without you knowing it, has rested your eyes by giving you a new location and depth of field to look at. This has almost instantly relaxed many of the muscles in your face. You’ve also increased blood circulation by walking around and standing up.

You’ve then taken some deep breaths. This has increased the amount of oxygen in your bloodstream, slightly slowing down your heart and temporarily lowering your blood pressure. Whats happened is you’ve just evoked a trigger in the parasympathetic nervous system causing a sense of relaxation. So this breathing exercise isn’t just some airy fairy advice, it’s actually aimed at triggering a physiological response.

And finally we turned our attention to our mental well being by using a tried and tested mind control technique. By really, and I mean really focusing on the “now”, all those regrets and dreams will seem distant and currently not important. Leaving you in the perfect zen like state to tackle any task.

This is an exercise routine that only takes a few minutes and works as perfect precursor to tackling any task on your to-do list.

What techniques do you use to focus?

Posted on February 05 2010

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