7 ways to stop the rabbit hole from hijacking your workday
Lately I’ve realized something about how I work as a business owner (and in general really).
I love a good rabbit hole.
If there’s a better tool, a smarter system, something that fascinates me, something that needs reformatting, a faster way to do something… I will easily disappear into research/get sh!t done mode for HOURS.
Not exaggerating…
Learning how things work, connecting all the dots, making everything consistent, learning new skills, and solving problems is honestly one of my favourite parts of running a business.
AND one of my super powers.
BUT recently I started noticing something…
Every time I come out of one of those deep dives, I feel more stressed than when I started.
YES, I feel great about what I just accomplished…but then I realize the 47 other things on my list that I ignored while in the rabbit hole, still need to get done…
Rabbit holes ARE productive, but for me they actually create more stress as often the rabbit hole was not something essential in my business.
Did I learn something new? Yes
Did I get the formatting perfect? Yes
Will what I did benefit me and my clients? Yes
Did I need to just spend 5 hours on it… NOPE
The rabbit hole pattern
Once I realized this I looked back on how I plan and function day to day. If I have a formatting task or something that I know will take hours… I try to block a chunk of time to do it all at once.
Here’s all the reasons I told myself this is a good idea:
Once I start, it’s more efficient to just do it all at once
If I stop mid way, I’ll lose time getting back into it later
If I block off the morning, then I can hammer through it and be done
I’ll feel better cause then it’s just done
And here’s all the problems with these statements:
Your brain can’t keep up the same level of productivity for 5 solid hours… it just can’t. So by doing it all at once, after a certain time (I don’t know the scientific specifics but there are some, I just don’t want to lose focus on writing this and go down a brain science rabbit hole.. lol) - anyways, after a certain chunk of time, you lose efficiency so you may feel like you were more efficient because it’s done, but if you had done it in smaller chunks, you probably would have done it faster.
Yes, it may take a little bit to get back into it, but as I said above, after hours you lose efficiency, you lose attention to detail, you start rushing cause you just want it over so the overall quality drops.
This is the biggest lie of all because the 3 hours I blocked in the morning wasn’t enough.. So now it’s 2pm because I’m “Almost done” and alllll the other things I was supposed to do aren’t touched so now I’m panicking and rushing but just can’t walk away because I’m almost there…
Yes, you may feel better, but the part you’re not thinking about is that the next time a task like this ends up on your list, you may avoid it for a while because you remember how long it took you to do it last time and now it’s a much scarier task!
It took me a LONG time to recognize that thing I did that I’m so proud of… is also the reason that I feel extreme anxiety on those days.
So, here’s what I’ve been implementing to help me avoid rabbit holes
Full disclosure… I have only recently identified that this is a problem… So while I’ve started doing these things, I’m still not an expert at it.
1. Schedule a certain amount of time for tasks that normally take you down the rabbit hole. Set a timer and stop when it goes off.
I will never be able to avoid a rabbit hole… and when you think about it, a rabbit hole is just focused time which is very important. For me, my rabbit holes are almost always around learning new things, improving systems or formatting - which are what I do for my clients and in my own business - so I will always need that focused time…
What needs to change is letting it take over my entire day.
SO, instead of banning them completely, I’m containing them.
I’m working on formatting a workbook for a client. It was done in a weird format and now needs to be properly formatted in PowerPoint so that the pages are consistent, it’s accessible to screen readers and it looks nice… previously I would block chunks of my day. NOW what I’m doing is blocking 1 hour at a time.
I set an alarm (I usually set a 5 min warning so I can wrap up the page I’m on), when the warning goes off I wrap up the page, save the version, and move the task to the next day.
This may seem like it will take way longer, but it’s actually getting it done faster because before this method I just kept moving the big block because other things came up so I didn’t have time for a rabbit hole.
But I do have time for 1 hour at a time!
2. Never schedule this hour at the end of the day
The other problem I ran into was that I would block my afternoons… So when I came out of my focused time I then realized I had 5 different emails to check and all of them had tasks…but now I’m up against the clock to wrap up for the day.
I don’t like to leave things unchecked at the end of the day, so by not giving myself a buffer, I was causing myself so much stress.
3. Leave buffer time between focus time and time specific tasks
It’s not just the end of the day that becomes an issue.
“I have an hour until my call with Frank, I’ll do my 1 hour now”
NOPE! Do not do this.
I may be able to commit to just doing 1 hour and walking away, but as a recovering rabbit holer - I still need to give my BRAIN time to unwind from what we just did. I need time to mentally shut that task off, get into the right zone for my call and also check to see if anything important came in while I was focused.
4. Separate the planning, testing and implementing
This is a BIG one. My happy place is mapping out the details for a new system. Whether we’re talking about a new CRM build, a Meta ads campaign, launching a new product or integrating automation into an existing workflow… I love the planning part and then I LOVE to make that sh!t happen!
DON’T DO IT!
Multiple reasons!
Your brain is tired… that’s A LOT
Your plan needs to be reviewed again to make sure it actually works and no details were missed BEFORE you start the testing
Combining testing and implementing is what ends up happening and it ALWAYS creates more work
By the end you’re 100% rushing because you’ve been at it so long that you just want it done, which means you might make mistakes, you might overlook something… you’re going to have to fix it later
What I’ve started doing is making sure those 3 things are done on different days. In the case where it’s time sensitive, I may do some on the same day, but I make sure there’s a good gap in between so I can reset.
There are some other things you can do if your rabbit hole style is different from mine!
Write down the idea and wait 2 days before chasing it. You might realize it wasn’t that important or you might realize it is important and have time to think through it before the focus time begins.
Do the small tasks before any focus time. Just in case you get sucked in and can’t get yourself out, get all the small tasks out of the way before you enter the danger zone.
Ask yourself one honest question before starting any focused time. Is this actually the most important thing in the business right now? If not, it can wait.
The importance of avoiding the rabbit hole
Running a business is rarely about doing the biggest or most exciting task on your list… the tasks that often lead to the rabbit hole.
The biggest goal as a business owner is to keep the entire machine moving, so learning how to control your focus time is a game changer!
