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Key points
- Distraction can become an obsession like any other compulsion.
- The result of distraction is that we may lose focus on what we’d find fulfilling and joyful.
- Purposeful intention, which uses the brain's quantum environment, can overcome distraction.
Has your mind ever been so cluttered and distracted that you lost track of time? The engaging nature of computers, smartphones, TVs, and other visual technology creates a virtual hamster wheel of distraction and mind-number clutter—paradoxically keeping you busy and in control. But in truth, you are anything but in control.
According to anthropologist Natasha Dow Schull, this is similar to what drives another kind of screen obsession—slot machine gambling. “When gamblers play,” explained Schull in an interview with the New Republic, “they’re going into a zone that feels comfortable and safe. You’re not playing to win, you’re playing to stay in the zone—a zone where all of your daily worries, your bodily pains, your anxieties about money and time and relationships, fall away.”
But there’s a dark side to distracting mental clutter—media or otherwise. It can steal away hours and fill our minds with unwanted static. The result is that we may lose focus on what we’d find fulfilling and joyful.
An American Psychological Association task force showed how media distraction could affect our moods and behavior—even producing eating disorders, low self-esteem, and depression.
Intention: The All-Purpose Distraction and Mind Clutter Cleanser
Worry not if you often feel driven to distraction and powerless to stem the tide of media and multi-tasking in your life. That’s because you possess one of the most powerful quantum tools in the universe—something technology can’t duplicate. The brain has ion channels that use ions that produce an action potential that causes neurons to fire. What's fascinating is that these ions operate on a quantum level.
According to quantum physicist Henry Stapp, intention can act upon ions in such a way that "...your intent can cause your brain to behave in a certain way. And by making it behave in a certain way...we actually change the structure of the brain, so you are changing the way you think in the future." In this sense, the intention is the very essence of free will.
However, suppose you are letting a habit of distraction or other sources outside of yourself determine your intentions. In that case, you might miss out on the full experience of being alive and participating in life.
Letting a habit of distraction determine your intentions reminds me of a client who kept repeating a negative pattern of behavior in his life. One day, exploring how this came to be, he shrugged his shoulders and exclaimed, “By some accident, I’ve become the person I am!”
An accident? Really? Maybe he just wasn’t ready to take accountability for how he was using his intentions and subtle thoughts! If you are not paying attention, it might seem to be totally accidental that you have once again ended up in that old, familiar ditch.
In the film The History of the World, Part 1, Mel Brooks, in the monarch's role, said the funny line, “It’s good to be the king.” But while it might have been good for the king, it certainly wasn’t good for his servants—or anyone else, for that matter. Conversely, it’s not good to be a slave to distracting media, technology, or any master or monarch that abuses its power to steal away your free will. That's why, if you are not paying attention, it might seem to be totally accidental that you have once again ended up in that old, familiar ditch.
Are you willing to relinquish what makes you most human?
Fortunately, you can engage this ultimate power tool of intention to scrub away distraction, no matter how much this mental clutter wants to fill up the nooks and crannies of your life. Best of all, because intention changes the brain, each incremental change helps you to gain greater clarity in the future.
Shaping an Effective Intention Practice
What do you really want out of life? Intentions wake us up to our deeper purpose. They help us feel alive and connect us to the desire for love, wellness, health, connection, and balance.
Remember that you have a choice and that you can choose by using intention.
intentions are most powerful when stated affirmatively and when they include the word ‘choose.’ For example, rather than saying, “I’ve got to lose weight,” try a proactive intention such as, “I choose to reach optimal health and weight by eating more unprocessed foods and taking a walk each day.”
To feel the difference, state your intention with and without the word "choose."
Here's another example. Instead of stating, “I want to be less influenced by technology and media,” a more positive intention might be, “I choose to build relationships by unplugging and focusing on face-to-face connections whenever possible throughout my day (when I arrive home, during dinner time, etc.).” Yes, once you have the broader intention, you can get specific with your intentions!
Conclusion
My book, Clearing Emotional Clutter, offers more ideas and suggestions for empowering yourself through the practice of intentionality. By focusing on intentions, you participate fully in life, remove mindless clutter and distractions, and become more explicit about how you want to live. Of course, you must do the daily work of repeating and reminding yourself of your intention. Then, there's the process of following up with actions that support your intentions daily.
Above all, don't give up. Keep working with intentions, and you will find that mental clutter and distractions become less of a problem. The more you activate your intentions—even the tiny ones—the greater freedom you will have to shape, determine and attain your life’s most satisfying goals.
