How distraction can keep you stuck

Quick story on the risks of distraction...

Many years ago I was a management consultant. A really bad one.

There was one low point where I had a 2½ hour commute (each way) to an assignment where I didn’t know what I was doing, or care about the project, and I remember people were allowed to smoke at their desks so I came home reeking of cigarettes.

Anyway, 5 hours a day on a train is a lot of time in which to miserably stare out of a window.

But like all negative emotions, being miserable has a purpose.

***

My misery was giving me a clear signal that something had to change.

So as I sat on my long commute, with nothing to do, I started to plan stuff.

I took up running. (Not on the train, when I got off).

And then yoga.

Meditation.

I stopped eating bread. I took an 8-week Buddhism course.

And I started reading psychology books with cheesy titles, which I would try to hide so as to preserve my cool and debonair image on the 7:12am to Woking.

A lot of that stuff didn’t work (I never became a Buddhist, and I injured myself in yoga).

But slowly, out of my misery, came a plan.

The point of this story is not about that plan, though.

It is what would have happened during those commutes if I’d had a smartphone.

****

With a smartphone, I would have had the opportunity to distract myself with endless cycles of social media, staying connected with friends, or I could have pretended I was living a meaningful life by ‘liking’ a few political posts.

Or I could have played some of those addictive arcade-style games to take my mind off things.

In other words, I would have been able to distract myself from my misery; anaesthetising myself from the sting of having a job I hated.

The question is, would that have helped me?

Maybe the long commutes would have been more tolerable.

But overall, I think it would have kept me stuck for longer.

And if there is one thing I regret, it’s not making the changes I needed to make sooner.