Welcome to the Determined to Dance podcast with your host, Jennifer Hallmark. Today’s episode, “Three Ways to Focus on Priorities and Stop Procrastination” looks at the three steps to improve our focus while leaving procrastination behind.

Are you ready? The world would have us march to its chaotic beat but God invites us to dance in His will and His way. Let’s take a moment to be energized, refreshed, and motivated to face the day, one spin and twirl at a time.

Show Notes: Three Ways to Focus on Priorities and Stop Procrastination

I don’t want to procrastinate. Focus is what I desire. I’ve been trying for the last hour to write this episode. But with the possibility of bad weather approaching, I turned the television on to catch the weather.

Big mistake.

I finally closed my laptop until the news was over. I totally lost focus.

Am I the only one who does this? I don’t think so. Over the past year or so, the ability to focus has diminished for me. Dancing with God has been hit or miss at times. The pandemic did play a part but I believe bad habits I already had, made that worse than it should’ve been. What bad habits cause me to lose focus and procrastinate?

Multi-tasking-I heard it said we don’t really do a bunch of things at one time as much as we flutter and dart between several tasks.
Device distractions-phone, television, Kindle, iPad, and computer. Need I say more?
Lack of planning-I’m a discovery writer. I don’t plot my stories. Instead, I daydream about them, then write as I go. Works for my novels, not so much when planning my day.

These are my top three. Summer tends to be a busy time and add in my loss of focus lately and I feel aimless. Like someone lost in a fog. That tends to lead to hopeless feelings and the next thing I know I’m quitting writing, ministry, life.

It’s all just too hard.

That’s what a loss of focus can do. How do we get our focus back? How do we settle down, blow away the fog of lost priorities, and concentrate on what’s at hand? Is it even possible?

I sure hope so. Here’s what is helping me, even today, to move forward and spin and twirl with a purpose.

To combat multitasking, I do one job at a time. I’m a thinker and an idea guru so I’ve always got so much going on in my brain. I’ve started keeping a notepad or using the notes app on my phone to write down an idea when I get it instead of stopping what I’m doing at the moment and changing tasks. Completing a job before going to the next is my new goal. So, even if I hear the dryer stop, I don’t stop what I’m doing to fold clothes. I write it on my list, finish the task I’m on, then go to the next one.
To combat devise distraction, I turn off the television and lay aside my devices while working. And that is so hard to do. I mean, we all want to keep up with what’s happening. But I’m tired of being so unfocused. So, no more housework while Facebooking. No more talking on the phone while working on the computer. I’m tying the first two together: no multi-tasking with no devices. I believe I can do this and you can too.
To combat my lack of planning, I keep a notebook beside me and my trusty Google calendar. If I’m too busy to write it down, I’m too busy. Once again, I go back to making notes, plans either before I go to bed or when I first get up. I just can’t keep up in my brain without help anymore.

I really struggled with titling today’s episode. The words stop procrastination seemed ridiculous. Can we really do that? Honestly, lately, issues have been a problem too. You know the kind: bad weather issues, health issues, family relational issues, too personal to talk about issues. Any of the above can tear apart even the healthiest focus and send us into a tailspin.

That’s when I stop,