Has it ever occurred to you that people who are prone to procrastination have the same problems as people who are obese? Just like fat people who indiscriminately consume harmful products that make them ultimately unfit for life sufferers, procrastinators are unable to refuse to consume tons of useless information that turns their brain from a unique powerful tool into a cemetery of other people's ideas and feelings. And just like body obesity, procrastination can be treated with a diet. Information.

Thousands of important events take place in the world every day. Yes, I also used to think that an educated, intelligent person should be aware of political life, the latest scientific discoveries, and emergencies. The latest book, music and film novelties. Sports. News. And so on, everyone can continue this list.

The only problem is that while you are watching other people's lives, your life is passing by. While you go through all these «the most necessary » sites, half a day has already passed and your head is full of porridge from information scraps. It's time to stop with this and go on a diet, returning to your brain the harmony of ideas and the speed of thinking.

Don't consume what doesn't concern you

An incredible amount of the most diverse information wrapped in bright attractive shells surrounds us and beckons at every corner. Stop poking everything into your head that they give you! For myself personally, I have developed this habit: every time my hand habitually clicks on an interesting link, I ask myself — «Am I reading this so that what? What is the goal?» (ask half the battle, be sure to wait for an answer :)).

You will be surprised how much absolutely unnecessary information you can filter out with this simple question. The vast majority of news will not affect your life in any form, so you will probably be able to clear most news and political sites from your bookmarks. And don't worry, if something really important happens, you will definitely find out about it. You don't need to watch the news « just in case».

Don't consume anything negative

Human nature is such that we are involuntarily attracted to negativity. Try to take a pencil and, when watching the evening news, calculate the ratio of negative and positive stories in the issue. I got a ratio of 10:2. Murders, fires, road accidents, sick children, crimes… Journalists have become lazy and unprofessional and instead of preparing plots visualize police reports.

Negative information does not bring anything of value into our lives. It distorts the perception of the world and our psyche. Block it completely. We always have enough problems of our own, so it really makes little sense to waste time worrying about the problems of people you don't even know.

Consume only a minimum of information

Now let's talk about work and how to handle it better. To complete any task, you may need to search for and master new knowledge. Finding information nowadays is not difficult at all, it is much more difficult to stop in time and get to work. After all, the link is strung on the link, page follows page, and now we are even further away from the beginning of the task than we were at the beginning.

It is very easy to cope with this. Before you start collecting information, just write in front of you a range of questions that you want to clarify. Do not click on links that look interesting, but do not correspond to the questions you have compiled. Stop at the moment when all the questions have been clarified for yourself. This simple tip will help you escape from aimless wandering around the network under the guise of work.

One day a week for training

Yes, of course we are not machines and we cannot put our brains in an information vacuum. Sometimes you can pamper yourself. Postpone articles that are interesting to you using one of the deferred reading services and set aside one day a week to study them. This is quite enough. Believe me, in this case you will be sooo responsible about the choice of articles and get special pleasure from their consumption. Ordinary information gum will turn into an exquisite delicacy.

Create a barrier

It's funny, but I remember a time when there was so little information that people could read newspapers between the lines and didn't sleep to listen to enemy voices at night. Today, everything has changed exactly the opposite. It is necessary to protect yourself from information. There are a huge number of ways and tools for this, we are constantly writing about them. Perhaps you should turn off the TV, block Facebook* and other distracting sites, install an ad blocker, clean bookmarks, or even have a specially configured browser to work.

In fact, if you want to become a successful entrepreneur, a good writer, the founder of a popular blog, or find yourself in any other field, then you must build and apply a whole system of defensive measures aimed at reducing the information noise around you. With every minute of your attention spent on a website you don't need, reading a stupid article or watching a funny video, you pay for other people's work, but you get one step further from your dream.

I'm sure it's time to stop this crazy gluttony and go on an information diet! What do you think about this?

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