Distractions are everywhere.

The New York Times reported, a typical office worker gets interrupted every 11 minutes – yet it takes an average of 25 minutes to return to the original task.

So, learning what distractions are and training yourself to avoid them is crucial to success at work.

It isn’t just at work though.

Distractions rear their ugly heads at home, and they keep us from the most important relationships in our lives.

So, what are the distractions at work and home?

Your phone.

Social media.

That latest app or time wasting game.

Clutter.

Multi-tasking.

Noise.

Hunger.

Email.

Kids activities.

Regrets over past mistakes.

Worries about tomorrow.

Slack and trello.

Binging on TV.

Andy Stanley said: Regardless of the nature of your vision, or visions if you are not careful, you will get distracted. The daily grind of life is hard on visions. Life is now. Bills are now. The crisis is now. Vision is later. It’s easy to lose sight of the main thing, to sacrifice the best for the sake of the good. All of us run the risk of allowing secondary issues to rob us of the joy of seeing our visions through to completion. Distractions can slowly kill a vision.

So what do you do?

The reality is, you can’t plan for distractions but you can do your best to minimize them.

You can and should do things like turning your phone off, turn off email and text message notifications. You shouldn’t have social media notifications on your phone. Schedule when you do your email and when you don’t.

But if you do that, it won’t guarantee you won’t have distractions.

So what then?

Here are two questions that help me navigate my day and accomplish what I need to:

What is most important to you?

This question is something you need to determine every day, whether it is at home, with your kids, at school or at work.

Each morning, I lay out the 3 most important things I need to accomplish each day.

This helps me to focus my time and energy.

Most of us allow other people to determine what is most important for us. Whether that is a school, a boss or a spouse. Sometimes this is out of your control, but often it is not.

What do you have the energy for?

The reality is, it might be essential, but you may not have the mental, emotional or physical capacity for it.

Each day for me is different like it is for you.

I have more energy on some days than others. Those are the days I plan my most important work.