What is an interruption? An interruption is anything that diverts your attention from an activity you have chosen to do to an activity that someone else has purposely or inadvertently chosen for you. Interruptions are normally random and without any consideration for the importance of, or impact on, your time and your personal priorities. Interruptions chew up time and energy.

There are two major categories of interruptions you face daily at home or at the office: telephones and people in person. The telephone rings, and you automatically stop what you are doing to answer it. The doorbell rings, and the same thing happens regardless of the importance of the task at hand. Someone is forcing you to switch gears instantly even though it is not your choice. "I'm not interrupting, am I?" is the typical remark. "Of course not," you answer politely without an ounce of integrity. Whether people interrupt you in person or on the telephone, they always seem to have something on their minds that just can't wait.

The time wasted because of an interruption is longer than the time span of the actual interruption. For instance, you are concentrating on writing a report, business plan, or important letter when your concentration is broken by the ringing of your phone. Not only do you lose the time you actually talk on the phone, but it will normally take you several additional minutes to regain your focus and get back up to speed with what you were doing. Switching gears takes time.

The telephone has become the greatest source of interruptions. In fact, it is an electronic instrument designed to interrupt. For some reason you and I were taught to believe that when the telephone rings, all else must be dropped in a race to answer it before it stops ringing. That habit is like having someone follow you around yelling "Freeze" twenty times a day and expecting you to stop in your tracks for three to ten minutes each time. The danger is that old phone habits unnecessarily eat up hours of your valuable time - time that cannot be replaced. Your level of effectiveness in life is determined both by the number of hours you have available to work on specific objectives and by how effectively you use those hours. The more hours that are wasted, the less effective you become.

Answering the phone just because it rings means turning over your time and attention to someone else at a moment's notice. Obviously, achieving your goals and dreams becomes far more difficult when you are constantly working someone else's agenda and at someone else's pace. The fact that a ringing telephone is given priority shows how illogical people have become about the use of the phone.


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