Lots has been written about working from home over the past year and a half, so what I have to say here might not be too new. I’m going to focus on a DBT mindfulness skill called “participating.” Participating involves throwing yourself into an activity fully, mind, body, and soul. When you’re participating, you’re paying attention to what you’re doing and experiencing and engaging fully in the present moment. To do this, you often have to let go of distractions, annoyances, thoughts, worries, judgments about yourself or others, self-consciousness, and other experiences that threaten to take you out of the present.
I’m still working from home most of the time, and I’ve found myself practicing participating quite a bit lately. Before I start my Zoom classes, meetings, etc., I usually set up a sound machine outside my home office to muffle the hustle and bustle of the kids getting ready (or not getting ready) for school, among other things going on in my home. The other day, though, the sound machine was woefully inadequate. Chaos ensued, and loud noises kept drawing my attention from my meetings. People kept showing up at my office door, and I had to excuse myself a couple of times to handle various situations.
When I noticed the cacophony of chaos, I tried to remind myself to notice this distraction and jump back into the conversation I was having. This involved actively turning my attention to the person I was meeting with, and actively listening and responding to what they were saying. When I had to leave and return, I did my best to do the same thing.
It was exhausting. My brain felt like a rubber band being pulled taught. One of the biggest challenges had to do with noticing but not becoming swept up with emotions and thoughts about what was going on outside of my office. Using the skill of participating, sometimes you need to acknowledge these emotions and thoughts and continue to turn your mind to what you’re doing. The idea is not to ignore or block out everything else, but to notice your distractions, see if you need to do anything about them, and then jump back into participating. As difficult as it was, I think I somehow managed to quickly manage the various things arising in my home and keep track of what was happening during my meeting, remember what the other person was saying, make helpful suggestions, and so forth.
Participating is an essential skill if you’re going to work from home, particularly if others are also at home. Life can be messy, stressful, and alarming, and you might often find yourself riding the wave of many distractions while trying to be productive. Use whatever tricks you can to make things easier (sound machine, sound buffering headphones, arranging your schedule so that you have more peace while you’re working, etc.), and throw yourself completely into the moment whenever you can. ~Alexander L. Chapman, Ph.D., R.Psych.