Playing an online bridge game from start to finish can be compared to working from home as a full-time freelancer.

The moment it’s time to sit down and focus, a hundred-and-one different distractions fall out of the sky.

Phones ring, important deliveries arrive, animals bark, and sometimes food might fuse to the pot unattended while you’re busy doing other things (and then still, busy trying to do even more other, other things).

Does that sound familiar to you?

Distractions won’t disappear, though you can learn what to do with them.

Here are 5 distractions from online bridge (& how to deal with them better).

1. Busy schedules

A busy schedule can easily get in the way of having time for online bridge games. When there are a million things to do, but all in the same day. It can be inconvenient when a busy schedule refers to your partner’s, too.

Use scheduling software to keep better track of games or what else you might have to do that aren’t bridge games on certain days.

As for how to keep it from interrupting your bridge, that’s up to you.

2. Difficult days

Some days are more difficult than others.

Rest assured, there’s almost always just that little bit of spare time to play a quick game – even if you to do it while you’re riding the bus, or waiting for take-out.

Vary your bridge play on the difficult days with quicker games, like Just Declare. It still keeps you playing bridge, but nobody will get angry if you leave the AI hanging because you had to go do something else

.3. Atmospheric noise

Barking dogs, sirens, traffic, wind, storms… Every single atmospheric or environmental noise you can imagine is a possible distraction to your bridge game – and sometimes there are just too many of them at once for your mind to deal with.

When playing online, you have the luxury of being able to add background noise of your choice. For example, overlay music or television while you’re playing.

Alternatively, noise cancelling headphones drown out everything else if you are a player who prefers their complete silence during the game.

4. App notifications

If you’re really tired of having your bridge game interrupted by app notifications, remember that notifications can be altered for each app (usually in its Settings-section).

If you don’t find it on the individual app, look under your main device Settings for Notifications.

For the duration of your game, make sure that you’re only getting the notifications you need most.

5. Group messages

Messages from social media groups can easily get overwhelming, especially if group members are involved in a heated conversation you don’t give much of a flying tea-kettle about.

Group messages (from WhatsApp, for example) can be muted if you don’t want to leave the group completely. Set the amount of time you’d like to shush the group for, and that’s the problem solved.

No more group messages interrupting your bridge game. There’s no reason why they should have to!