How Your Untamed Mind Affects Your Productivity

The human mind is always on the move, producing up to 100,000 thoughts per day, and in today’s busy world, your brain is bombarded with seven times as much stimuli as your grandparents experienced. Add to this the longer working hours, the traffic jams, the more distractions and the rising stress levels.

So what are the signs of an untamed mind? And how do we tame the craziness of our day to day life?

Here is a rundown and the answers below on how you can re-balance the wildness that disables you from producing the results that you desire.

What An Untamed Mind Looks Like

A mind, which is not content with existing in the present and jumps from thought to thought like a monkey that jumps from one tree to another, is known as an untamed mind or monkey mind. It gets easily distracted by the thoughts that pass through.

Buddha describes the agitated, easily distracted and incessantly moving behavior of ordinary human consciousness as the monkey mind.

How Your Productivity Is Affected

Many people are so busy chasing a productive lifestyle that they often forget to sit back and think about their most important tool; the brain.

If you are a busy person, with a tight schedule and a lot of deadlines, you will generally send a lot of fight-or-flight signals to your brain, which will respond by being jumpy or scattered.

A bouncing mind fills you with anxiety and your thoughts sway from fear on one end to desire on the other and you are rarely able to focus on either for long.

An untrained mind is the most common productivity blocker and when it is pushed beyond its limit, the productivity gets affected. There are times when there are so many things to do and so many pulls on your attention that you just do not know what to do or where to start. You are not aware of your surroundings and you do not live in the present moment. This is due to untrained focus and you should learn to tune out your distractions, harness your mind and mental resources.

Switching between tasks frequently, doing several things at a time and not concentrating on the task you are doing now will only affect your work productivity and you cannot possibly do any of them to the best of your ability. You end up doing more, but the quality is compromised.

Your mind gets distracted with unimportant things and you tend to waste time and energy by concentrating on these unimportant things. This will cause stress, and a stressed out mind will not work effectively and this may further affect your productivity.

Meditation Will Help Tame Your Mind and Increase Your Productivity

You can improve your productivity when your mind is at peace and this can be obtained with meditation. Meditation is a state of mind where you think about nothing and it provides clarity in thoughts that result in a blissful life.

Buddha has shown how meditation can tame the drunken monkeys in your minds and how they will grow more peaceful if you bring them into submission with a consistent practice of meditation. Regular practice of meditation will enhance your concentration power, creativity, focus, relaxation and mental faculties, which will lead to an increase in productivity.

Meditation helps you achieve mindfulness – the mental state of being completely aware of your surroundings and living in the present moment. Research shows that meditation can help you stay on task longer and be less distracted, and it also improves your memory and decreases stress.

Improve Your Focus and Productivity

Being mindful will help you focus on the present moment and accept all that is around you. You do not worry about the past, future or anything that does not affect you in this moment. You will be able to accomplish more, in less time, because meditation will help you to focus on a task and tune out distractions. Being aware makes it easy to enjoy what you are doing and when you enjoy what you are doing, you give your best effort. Best efforts have far greater rewards than efforts you put when your attention is scattered.

With a focused mind you will learn to let go of non-essential activities that prevent you from taking your time and doing your best on the important things.

A clear mind knows what is important in life and what is a complete waste of time and energy, and this knowledge will help you break from the time-wasting activities.

How A Tamed Mind Works

A clear, tamed and focused mind promotes a sense of peace and well-being, which makes you feel good about everything you do, and this in turn increases motivation and happiness in doing your tasks.

Several scientific studies have proved that meditation reduces stress hormones and gains stability for the mind to focus, and it helps improve everything from productivity to severe depression.

Happier and healthier people are more productive and creative.

Increase your productivity by controlling the incessant chatter that goes on in your heads, which if unchecked, can drive you nuts.

Reduce stress and increase your focus with meditation and this will improve your productivity as well as your efficiency.

Avoid the ineffective practice of multi-tasking and enjoy life at a more relaxed pace and get everything done effectively.

Something that really helps me is to build healthy habits and new routines to help keep me focused and my mind clear and calm.

Incorporating the following into your morning will set a productive tone for the rest of your day and help to keep your mind clutter free.

– Prioritise your ‘to do’ list

– Meditate

– Exercise before you start on your ‘to do’ list for the day

– Eat a well balanced breakfast before you do anything!

Creating new habits won’t always feel natural or easy at first but if you keep persisting they will become part of your day and start to work their magic to create a clearer mind and a more productive lifestyle.