I have a 9-5 sit-down-at-a-laptop job, and the only time I feel like I can focus on “deep work” that takes a lot of unbroken attention is at night between 7-11pm after I’ve already been at my desk all day. I get distracted to some extent by responding to Slack conversations and participating in meetings (some scheduled, some not), but I also spend a lot of time procrastinating doing non-work computer distractions (watching YouTube videos, following up on family stuff, checking my credit card statement for anything weird, and obviously Reddit). Although these same distractions exist at night, I’m able to ignore them then, so I’m ultimately able to deliver the work expected of me. Obviously, though, I’d rather not sit at my laptop for 12 hours and eat my prime free time after work.
Have any of you who’ve dealt with something similar found a consistent solution to this? Obviously the answer is “stop engaging in things that distract you,” but my problem is that I just find myself doing them out of the blue.
(inb4 “You laptop job guys don’t know how good you’ve got it!” This question is not directed at you.)