These days most everyone has at least one, many people have several, and some seem to be controlled by them.

I’ll admit it. I have a PC, two phones, an iPad, and a Kindle. That’s not to mention three TVs. While my number of devices sounds more like ‘first world problems’ and somewhat like me showing off, I didn’t mean it to be and, to be honest, it embarrassed me a bit when I wrote all of them down for this post.

I’m talking to more and more people that say one of two things. The first is that they don’t read books anymore because they’re too distracted and don’t have the attention span they used to have. The second thing I hear is “Yes, I read a lot. I’m always on Twitter, Facebook, blog sites, and News Feeds.” Okay, while there are words on all of those apps, that’s not my definition of ‘reading’.

Is it my imagination or are fewer and fewer people picking up books and reading them these days? As a writer and indie author, this worries me to no little extent. I’m not putting myself outside of this group, my confession regarding gadgets sounds very distracting, right? However, for me, being…well…beyond my twenties…significantly…I’m not too worried. I have book reading apps on all my devices and I read about half my books electronically these days. But I grew up with a love of reading and a love for books, particularly physical books, in my youth.

If you’re one of those people that must answer texts, even if you’re driving, I imagine that getting through even one page of a book, with text, email, news, and twitter alerts bombarding you, must be quite a challenge.

I’m not sure anyone has a ready answer for this, but concentration and focus are so important in everyday life. I’m working constantly to set goals to focus, concentrate, and finish and always trying to set boundaries between my priorities and someone else’s requests for my time via apps.

The struggle between informed tech-geek and focused accomplishments is real.

How good are you at keeping yourself from being distracted?

What is your best tactic for staying focused?