The Science of Focus!
Wanna stay laser-focused at work? (Does fasting really help? What about exercise? And how do you feel about Megadeth?)
What’s actually happening inside my head when I focus?
There’s been some pretty weird methods for maintaining focus. Demosthenes shaved half his head, but only half, so he was too embarrassed to leave his desk. Victor Hugo wrote naked so he wasn’t tempted to leave his room. Maya Angelou’s house was filled with too many pretty distractions, so she rented the smallest, ugliest hotel rooms she could find and used them as offices.
The playwright Friedrich Schiller filled a desk drawer with rotting apples because the smell kept him awake. Jonathan Franzen superglued the ethernet port on his computer shut so he couldn’t go online. George R.R. Martin, the author of Game of Thrones, still writes on a 1980s computer because it can’t connect to the internet, there’s no autocorrect, and — best of all — readers can’t tell him what they think should happen next. (White Walker dance party!)
In other words, even smart people struggle to stay focused. But you don’t need to shave half your scalp! You’re better than that!
The key to focus is boosting norepinephrine inside your brain: That’s the neurotransmitter that triggers sharp, focused attention and helps you ignore distractions. So how do you do that?
One way is exercise — but it has to be intense (a casual walk probably won’t work) and last at least 10 minutes. (A round of push ups will do the trick, and impress (or freak out) your officemates.)
There’s also evidence that intermittent fasting sharpens focus by raising adrenaline — though it can also make you so grumpy that your colleagues will beg you to have a snack and go back to push ups. (Andrew Huberman loves fasting for focus almost as much as he loves complicated explanations about fasting for focus.)
Or, try a cold plunge! A 20-second dip in ice water — repeated three times a week for 12 weeks — reliably spiked norepinephrine in studies. If you can warm up your fingers fast enough, you can use that boost to power through your inbox.
Finally, the single most important tactic for improving focus is getting enough sleep. What’s most striking is that sleep-deprived people don’t believe they’re less focused, even though every study shows they are. (Luckily, there’s a great newsletter about how to sleep better.)
Okay, but I’m not going to freeze myself or do push ups. What are normal things I can do to focus more at work?
Email, Slack and other interruptions are the single greatest enemy of workplace attention. The key is batching your notifications and minimizing your inbox. In one experiment, office workers received notifications only three times a day — at 9am, 3pm and 9pm — and were significantly more attentive, productive and happier at the end of the day. They didn’t turn off their email or ignore Slack. They simply reduced the notifications and minimized inboxes, which put them in control of when interruptions occurred.
Another science-backed tip: If you are interrupted, write down how you’ll restart. If someone comes to your desk, scribble “go back to memo“ before chatting. (Writing it out makes it more likely you’ll follow the plan.) Or, jot down a plan in the morning (”I’m gonna do expenses after break“), and then rely on that note later. Researchers call these “ready-to-resume“ plans.
And noise! Too much noise can be a distraction. But studies show that a moderate noise level (about 70 decibels, similar to traffic on a highway, or general coffee-shop chatter) often improves performance. But the noise needs to be steady and predictable. A low background buzz of familiar songs is great. Jim, the guy in the next cubicle, singing every third stanza of Megadeth, not so much.
Also, take breaks. Air traffic controllers are required to take regular breaks to keep their focus sharp, and must have at least nine hours of sleep or rest between shifts. Breaks are also great for kids (and probably Jim, who could use a pause after all the Megadeth). In one study, schoolchildren who got a “physical movement minute” in the middle of a lesson demonstrated much more attention throughout class than other students. Studies show, for adults, just six minutes of movement can reset your focus.
Now the flip side, how do I boost creativity? And how do I get through something that’s really boring?
For analytical undertakings, ‘task-switching’ is usually bad. But when it comes to creative tasks, ‘task-switching’ can be very helpful — as long as both tasks require creativity. One study found that people who alternated between creative tasks (like brainstorming uses for a brick, then a toothpick, back and forth) generated more original ideas than people who finished one task before starting the next.
Meditation can also help by building mental habits that reduce ‘mind-wandering’. (Instead of getting drawn into trying to remember that Megadeth lyric, you blissfully let the question slide away.) And there’s an answer to how much meditation you need: 13 minutes a day, for a minimum of 8 weeks, seems optimal for boosting attention and focus.
Finally, if you have to do something really boring, focus on what’s around you rather than yourself. Swimming is a notoriously boring sport. (Michael Phelps’s coach once told me he looks for swimmers who “don’t think too much. If they’re too smart, they get bored and quit.”) When swimmers are instructed to think about their body (”focus on pulling your hands back and pushing your feet down”) they perform worse than if they are instructed to think about the water (”focus on how it moves over you.”) Same boring stroke, same boring swimmers — but they are significantly faster if they start thinking about anything besides themselves.
How do you focus at work? How do you avoid distractions? What’s your favorite Megadeth song? Hit reply or let me know in the comments!
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I can’t name a single Megadeath song, but I do have a few methods that help me focus. One seems pretty obvious, but you didn’t mention it, so I will. My job involves a lot of meetings and emails, usually about disparate topics, so I should not plan to focus much over the course of my workday. Writing is important to me, so I start writing when I get to my office (before 8 a.m.) before I do any other kind of work. This form of pre-commitment is probably the best thing I have ever done to improve productivity. I also typically exercise before I write or do other kinds of work, so I suppose that habit improves my focus. This exercise often involves swimming, which brings me to my question. How cold does pool water have to be to stimulate focus? I’d love to know that I’m getting a double benefit by swimming in cold water! Oh, one more thing: I have a very useful trick for making swims productive. As you mentioned, swimming can be really boring. During my swims, I usually rehearse poems I have memorized and review vocabulary. This little trick reduces the boredom while increasing my productivity. I don’t suppose everyone wants to memorize poems or expand their vocabulary, but swimming is also a good time to think through issues and even write (well, compose without using a laptop, which, unlike our brains, cannot focus under water).
How do I focus on my work?
Today, by reading your newsletter 😂. It reminded me what I wanted to work on.
Thanks 😊.