Online OCD loop by Jeff Walker
Posted 3rd December 2014 at 09:49 PM by edusegzy1
Today I wanna talk about the online OCD loop and you probably know what I’m talking about, that’s where you go and check your email and maybe go check your stats and you go check your social and often times you go back and check your email again and maybe you’ve got a few different activities you can put in there, but know what I’m talking about. We are pretty good at creating the online OCD loop and those were horrible days.
I’ve got to give a shout out to my friend Dean Jackson. I think He’s the first person I heard that term from the OC, actually it’s the OCD loop but you know those are horrible days but they are really easy to get caught in there and it’s a great way to avoid doing anything productive. In my opinion, pretty much all of us get caught in there from time to time and maybe I taught the text message is included as well. I’m not perfect, I get caught in it as well but I try, I know personally those were the worst days I had. When it gets to the end of the day, I know I’ve been busy and doing stuff but have accomplished absolutely nothing. I could as well pick up my bike or be playing my guitar and have fun enjoying the time I have wasted, but you know since we are always online, we are constantly living in the world’s perfect mechanism, the world’s perfect distraction machine, that’s what the internet does for us. It’s got all these flashes, bells and whistles that just wanna draw our attention from doing our biggest, best most productive work, work that is going to build our business, it’s going to build our income, It’s going to build our lifestyle and it’s going to make a huge contribution to the world. But we’ve got all these things that just wanna pull us from it.
So how do u avoid that? I think in general even though I do have in those days I’m pretty good at avoiding that. Well I’m actually using the OCD loop and ideally one of the things I do is that I’ve built rituals and processes within my day to avoid that. Like here is the big one. Phone, I don’t have my phone next to my bed, I don’t even have in my bedroom or even at any level in my house. It is downstairs and often I will not, I never check my phone first thing in the morning and often it is an hour or even 2 hours before I look at my phone for the first time, and you know the thing is I don’t invent this thing, but basically your inbox and your text messages, they represent the world’s to-do list for you, that’s everyone else’s agenda for you. You have to set your own agenda.
Another thing I do is that I have rituals that I set up. I have every morning ritual. I shot a video about that, go check that out on my blog, but I have a morning ritual that sets me up for a great day. So part of those morning rituals are those things that quiet my mind, like yoga, like meditation, like having a usually nutritious breakfast. These are the things I do before I ever get to my computer. My computer is in my office. I go to my office to do my work. I don’t have a computer set up in other places in my house or if I do. It’s just for things that are not work related and I am not getting out of bed and looking at my ipad, I’m getting out of bed and following my ritual that sets me up. I come out of yoga, then meditation and my mind is quiet and I don’t get pulled into that OCD loop.
The other thing I do is that I get off late. I just got back from a sixteen days trip to grand canyon …., floating down the river through grand canyon and for the sixteen days, no electricity, well other than my headlamp, there is no cell phones, there is no cell phone covers down there. We had a sat phone for emergencies, but even at sat phone most of the time don’t even have signal and we were shot completely offline for sixteen days, that quiet my mind. It quiet my mind so much now when I came back even a week and half after I came back I still find myself less driven to do those OCD things, things like checking out my emails, my text messages. In fact, a few days after, I went for a hike with my wife we were gone for most of the day. I left my phone in the house, I didn’t even bring my phone with me. Imagine what will it feel like to be without your phone for most of the day, Will that be good for you? Will that be something that will help quiet your mind? You can do that. Check out you can be without your phone, you don’t have to be available every minute of the hour and you will train your mind to quiet down and you know that’s how you get into your seriously productive time. You know there is the whole idea of multitasking, it’s a crack. Studies have shown that multitasking doesn’t work. If you want to be productive, If you wanna do your genius work, you have to turn off your wifi, that’s a great way to do it. But you have to get out of that OCD loop.
Jeff Walker
I’ve got to give a shout out to my friend Dean Jackson. I think He’s the first person I heard that term from the OC, actually it’s the OCD loop but you know those are horrible days but they are really easy to get caught in there and it’s a great way to avoid doing anything productive. In my opinion, pretty much all of us get caught in there from time to time and maybe I taught the text message is included as well. I’m not perfect, I get caught in it as well but I try, I know personally those were the worst days I had. When it gets to the end of the day, I know I’ve been busy and doing stuff but have accomplished absolutely nothing. I could as well pick up my bike or be playing my guitar and have fun enjoying the time I have wasted, but you know since we are always online, we are constantly living in the world’s perfect mechanism, the world’s perfect distraction machine, that’s what the internet does for us. It’s got all these flashes, bells and whistles that just wanna draw our attention from doing our biggest, best most productive work, work that is going to build our business, it’s going to build our income, It’s going to build our lifestyle and it’s going to make a huge contribution to the world. But we’ve got all these things that just wanna pull us from it.
So how do u avoid that? I think in general even though I do have in those days I’m pretty good at avoiding that. Well I’m actually using the OCD loop and ideally one of the things I do is that I’ve built rituals and processes within my day to avoid that. Like here is the big one. Phone, I don’t have my phone next to my bed, I don’t even have in my bedroom or even at any level in my house. It is downstairs and often I will not, I never check my phone first thing in the morning and often it is an hour or even 2 hours before I look at my phone for the first time, and you know the thing is I don’t invent this thing, but basically your inbox and your text messages, they represent the world’s to-do list for you, that’s everyone else’s agenda for you. You have to set your own agenda.
Another thing I do is that I have rituals that I set up. I have every morning ritual. I shot a video about that, go check that out on my blog, but I have a morning ritual that sets me up for a great day. So part of those morning rituals are those things that quiet my mind, like yoga, like meditation, like having a usually nutritious breakfast. These are the things I do before I ever get to my computer. My computer is in my office. I go to my office to do my work. I don’t have a computer set up in other places in my house or if I do. It’s just for things that are not work related and I am not getting out of bed and looking at my ipad, I’m getting out of bed and following my ritual that sets me up. I come out of yoga, then meditation and my mind is quiet and I don’t get pulled into that OCD loop.
The other thing I do is that I get off late. I just got back from a sixteen days trip to grand canyon …., floating down the river through grand canyon and for the sixteen days, no electricity, well other than my headlamp, there is no cell phones, there is no cell phone covers down there. We had a sat phone for emergencies, but even at sat phone most of the time don’t even have signal and we were shot completely offline for sixteen days, that quiet my mind. It quiet my mind so much now when I came back even a week and half after I came back I still find myself less driven to do those OCD things, things like checking out my emails, my text messages. In fact, a few days after, I went for a hike with my wife we were gone for most of the day. I left my phone in the house, I didn’t even bring my phone with me. Imagine what will it feel like to be without your phone for most of the day, Will that be good for you? Will that be something that will help quiet your mind? You can do that. Check out you can be without your phone, you don’t have to be available every minute of the hour and you will train your mind to quiet down and you know that’s how you get into your seriously productive time. You know there is the whole idea of multitasking, it’s a crack. Studies have shown that multitasking doesn’t work. If you want to be productive, If you wanna do your genius work, you have to turn off your wifi, that’s a great way to do it. But you have to get out of that OCD loop.
Jeff Walker
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