The problem shows up most insidiously when we need to write.  Writing is hard, which makes any conceivable distraction a dangerous enemy. Fortunately, there is a simple yet powerful solution.  Trick is you (1) need to know it exists, and then (2) resolve to use it when you’re writing.

Have you heard of ‘Full Screen Mode’ before? Well, now you have.  It’s an option for working in a word processing program like Word or WordPerfect, or even Apple’s Pages program. Once you enter ‘Full Screen Mode’ the other clutter on your computer screen disappears and all you see is the page of text that you are working on.  Trust me, this is something you want to learn how to turn on.  Then you want to actually use it when you write on your computer.

Here’s how you do it in Word.  Not sure about WordPerfect, but if you search the Help menu you should be able to find it quickly.  Oh, and if you use Acrobat or Adobe Reader, you can do it there too.  The shortcut is Command L (Mac) or Control L (PC).