Where is my mind?

[laohaire]

My ability to focus on work has been pretty much gone for months. What is going on? Has this ever happened to you? A health issue? A "just snap out of it and stop being lazy" issue?

I work from home (not for myself, for someone else's company), so I do have distractions. I can, say, sit on MDC all day and it's not like my boss will see. And I can't say that procrastination is a new thing for me.

But I don't feel good about this. I really, truly, sincerely am grateful for my job. I have it great. I think this every day - yet why can't I show my gratitude in the way that I obviously should, by doing a great job?

Not to mention, my inability to focus is not good for my family. What if I get fired? What if my procrastination costs us some business?

I really want to be a good, productive person. And yet my mind just feels like Jello.

[lunarlady]

Are you getting enough sleep and exercise? Those are the two things that really affect my ability to focus.

[laurabfig]

I work from home about an hour of each work day, and I can imagine that if I did it full time it would be really easy to be distracted and not get as much done as I could/should.  Do you have any co-workers who you could be semi-accountable to about what you get done in a day?

Also, I think I get distracted by everything I have to do, which makes it hard to focus on the task at hand.   the book Getting Things Done by David Allen really helped me to get organized and made me more productive at work...maybe that would be worth a read.

[laohaire]

Originally Posted by lunarlady 

Are you getting enough sleep and exercise? Those are the two things that really affect my ability to focus.

 Just saw your reply. Exercise is a no, and you're right, that's something I need to address asap. Sleep is a general yes though I may still be recovering from 3 years of serious sleep deprivation (but I've had 2 years to recover). I just don't feel as sharp as I used to feel pre-motherhood.

[laohaire]

Originally Posted by laurabfig 

I work from home about an hour of each work day, and I can imagine that if I did it full time it would be really easy to be distracted and not get as much done as I could/should.  Do you have any co-workers who you could be semi-accountable to about what you get done in a day?

Also, I think I get distracted by everything I have to do, which makes it hard to focus on the task at hand.   the book Getting Things Done by David Allen really helped me to get organized and made me more productive at work...maybe that would be worth a read.

No coworkers. I work for two partners and neither of them look over my shoulder. And I don't want them to :) I just want to clear my head and be productive. Exercise is definitely something I need to do.

I love GTD and have it right here. I'm reasonably organized, I just don't have mental focus for tasks that take me longer than maybe 30 minutes. I'm great at multitasking, I can get things off my plate and onto somebody else's (in a legitimate way) pretty well, but sitting here and grinding out a proposal that takes 4 hours of effort ... I just don't have the brain for it, or motivation, or something.