{"id":628,"date":"2011-09-08T11:45:41","date_gmt":"2011-09-08T15:45:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/?p=628"},"modified":"2021-03-22T08:48:41","modified_gmt":"2021-03-22T12:48:41","slug":"sifting-through-distraction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/?p=628","title":{"rendered":"Sifting through distraction"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/picasaweb.google.com\/lh\/photo\/JmpbmKxRSdQsWnRLoBMIIw?feat=directlink\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/lh6.googleusercontent.com\/-pFvNWAXVfkQ\/S8N1FSf5A_I\/AAAAAAAACCw\/RUbDR1CICe4\/s640\/Hunter%252527s%252520Face%252521.jpg\" alt=\"Hunter\" width=\"276\" height=\"207\"><\/a>In an environment of interruption and shifting priorities, focus cannot be determined by prioritizing a project.&nbsp; If focus is to be achieved, let alone narrowed, choice must be used.&nbsp; The question of &#8220;Why are you working on that instead of this other thing?&#8221; must be able to be answered, without fear of recrimination, &#8220;Because I chose to work on this now.&#8221;&nbsp; Because, really, when the phrase &#8220;all things being equal&#8221; applies to priorities, my focus wanders all over the damn map.<\/p>\n<p>This morning, I&#8217;m arguing on the internet to wake myself up.<\/p>\n<p>My amazing wife has suggested to me that I not think about my goals in terms of which I should accomplish, and which I should discard.&nbsp; She has suggested that, instead, I think about them in terms of which I should accomplish now, and which I should accomplish down the line.&nbsp; This feels like procrastination to me, but upon further reflection, all deadlines for these projects are self-imposed.&nbsp; My feeling of having to get them *all* done *right now* is internal, and is not a part of the goals and projects themselves.&nbsp; If I look at my goals this way, I can arbitrarily assign importance, perhaps based on length of time required to achieve the goal, and then choose a goal on which to focus.&nbsp; I can do all of this without feeling like I am abandoning the other things that I&#8217;ve started.<\/p>\n<p>I need to finish what I start, after all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In an environment of interruption and shifting priorities, focus cannot be determined by prioritizing a project.&nbsp; If focus is to be achieved, let alone narrowed, choice must be used.&nbsp; The question of &#8220;Why are you working on that instead of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/?p=628\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[],"tags":[8],"class_list":["post-628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-adventures-in-parenthood"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paQnES-a8","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=628"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7971,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions\/7971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcrampton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}