There are many things that distract me when I sit down to write. Sometimes it's the cat harassing me for food even when there's still plenty in her bowl. If you've read Journal of a Cat of Leisure, you might have some idea of how exacting she can be.
It's rarely the phone - I just don't give my number out preferring to email - I like it quiet. When someone does phone, it's either a cold call that's somehow managed to get past the telephone preference service, or one of very few people. If it's the former, it drags me out of the 'zone' and although it takes no time to end the call, regaining momentum can take time. If it's the latter then it might be a while before I get back to my train of thought.
It's rarely the TV. Generally I have no idea what's on in the background until something really loud happens. There are few shows I actually sit and watch. If it's something like Jerry Springer, which occasionally sneaks up in the schedule without me noticing (and I really should be in bed by then anyway), there's a reflex response of channel changing before the screaming begins but it's reflex and doesn't alter my pattern. Occasionally I hear a random sentence that makes my ears prick up and I end up saying something on facebook or tweeting.
There's the worst distraction though, and upon reflection I admit, I might be just a little bit OCD. When I start up my laptop, I like to have my programs in a certain order on the taskbar so that I can switch between them without scanning through them. I get most upset when Windows decides to rearrange everything without asking me. I'm so particular about it, it applies not only to the applications in the taskbar but also to the tabs in the browser and the order I open documents, so when stacked I know which is which. Right now, I have 9 applications running, one of which has 7 stacked documents and I don't have to distract myself to refer between any of them. Sad, right? The distraction is the browser in the taskbar. If the last page I viewed was a social media page, it stays on top and the number of new notifications or tweets or messages appears there, ticking up and up. It draws my eye whenever it changes and I invariably end up looking at what's waiting.
Now, here's where the OCD thing comes out. Why not just close my browser or view one of the other pages last? I can't. If the browser is not the second from left application on the bar, I can't work. If I can't see the ticking numbers, I worry that when I do look there'll be a hundred and it'll take ages to check. This doesn't happen when I'm doing my day job from home. I have a different order of programs and a different set of pages, but it ties to a different mindset. At the office, the desk has to be laid out a certain way before I even start opening programs. I've looked at neurolinguistic programming to help me figure out my odd behaviours and it seems to be something I've done from childhood. The pencil case in a specific place on the school desk, and I could never concentrate without a pen in my hand.
So really, is the distraction social media, or is it my own psychological programming? Writing this blog in itself has dragged me away from what I was writing before this and I'm only writing this blog because I was being distracted by the number of tweets going up. Maybe I should do something completely unrelated for a while!
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