Camerons Moll’s 10 more things he’s learned in one year of freelancing, item 6;
Staying focused is a luxury few freelancers enjoy. Did I just write that? I did. Think about it: You’re on your own. You’re the boss. If you lack the necessary self-control to stay on task, life as a freelancer may not be your cup of tea. I struggle much like anyone else, so it’s a continual battle to keep waywardness in check. Refresh the RSS feeds only once per day. Use IM sparingly. Multi-task less (yes, less). “Great souls have wills; feeble ones have only wishes” suggests one Chinese proverb. Stay on task, or you’ll be left wishing you had. (emphasis mine)
Absolutely. Feeds once or twice (like reading the paper basically), IM only a few hours in the afternoon, sometimes morning. I’m having problems with the don’t multitask though. For example, right this moment I’m answering emails but decided to spend 10 minutes on closing a few tabs in Firefox, and boom, blogging. Shouldn’t do that ;)