How to Concentrate

Weed helps some people focus. Don't want to do drugs? Play a sport, talk to some good friends, get involved with reality and try to leave the virtual one. Will provide for less distractions. Problem isn't so much you focusing on things as its just that their are lots of things to distract you, reduce and limit those distraction and you should be able to get the more important tasks done. My 2 cents.

Make some simple rules and stick to them. These helped me during the master's crunch time:

1. Get to the office at 8 every day.

2. Don't read mail or surf the web until 12.

Usually I'd be so absorbed by the actual work by 12 that I didn't bother reading mail or seeking out other diversions for a few more hours.

  On 4/9/2012 at 9:06 AM, ZiggomaticV17 said:

Weed helps some people focus. Don't want to do drugs? Play a sport, talk to some good friends, get involved with reality and try to leave the virtual one. Will provide for less distractions. Problem isn't so much you focusing on things as its just that their are lots of things to distract you, reduce and limit those distraction and you should be able to get the more important tasks done. My 2 cents.

sport and talking are two things I need to work on

  On 4/9/2012 at 9:18 AM, verticalhold said:

  On 4/9/2012 at 9:06 AM, ZiggomaticV17 said:

Weed helps some people focus. Don't want to do drugs? Play a sport, talk to some good friends, get involved with reality and try to leave the virtual one. Will provide for less distractions. Problem isn't so much you focusing on things as its just that their are lots of things to distract you, reduce and limit those distraction and you should be able to get the more important tasks done. My 2 cents.

 

sport and talking are two things I need to work on

Those are probably more important than you think. At least the talking part. Read an article recently that basically said what makes humans happy is interaction with friends and other people. There is a chance you play those things to try and make yourself feel happy/good about yourself. The same can be achieved with friends and sport, real world stuff you know? I found myself playing less games/spending less time on the Computer as I picked up Soccer. Now I play that every night, it tires me out and I sleep more or less earlier than usual and wake up feeling refreshed. As a result of playing less games I've found more time to study and as a result of that I'm pretty sure I'm going to finally pass my math class this year.

So I speak mainly from personal experience here. Been smoking too but that's actually having me sit around watching adventure time with some friends. Good times but probably as distracting as anything else,

I would suggest to try waking up at a reasonable hour in the morning (if it's not already the case) and starting the day with a good breakfast, then working on your stuff. I'm always more efficient and lucid around 9 ~ 11 am.

But I know it's not always easy to go to bed earlier in the night than what you would naturally do.

Find something you are actually excited about doing and do that instead.

  Quote

I would suggest to try wanking up

Fixed

  On 4/9/2012 at 5:16 PM, AAAAh said:

  Quote

I would suggest to try wanking up

 

Fixed

woops, seems like I forgot a letter indeed. Three times in the morning is generally a good average. It will make you feel better and will give to your skin a slightly healthier tone.

Pomodoro technique sounds awesome. I'm trying it.

Oh yeah, and web graphs help me organize my day. Haven't used them in a while.

  On 4/9/2012 at 4:59 PM, Antape said:

I would suggest to try waking up at a reasonable hour in the morning (if it's not already the case) and starting the day with a good breakfast, then working on your stuff. I'm always more efficient and lucid around 9 ~ 11 am.

 

But I know it's not always easy to go to bed earlier in the night than what you would naturally do.

thanks for the advice guys, I'm going to go with this one ^ starting from, errr, tomorrow (I aint getting up in 6 hours' time)

what? no, don't listen to them they're crazy. They're just stating a bunch of unrelated tips for who knows what. bunch of noobs.

You really have to press your temples with your index fingers, don't use other fingers if you're new to concentrating, one variant is to do it with the middle finger but only if the index is alongside it to help, but don't try this at first, it's an advanced technique. You can press both or just one of your temples but pressing both will yield better results. While you're doing this squint your eyes slightly, this is the trickier part since you don't want to squint so hard that you can't see (unless what you want to concentrate on isn't visible) or without enough force so that you're merely closing your eyes (you don't want to fall asleep). The point is to exert equal but opposite amounts of force in the muscles around your eyes as to maintain them half open but so that you're constantly making an effort to keep them in this unable state, think of it as a coin lying on the thin side or as balancing a long stick with the palm of your hand. Anyway, I hope you were able to concentrate long enough to read all this. Good Lu

The only two things that work for me:

1. change your surroundings. absolutely avoid mixing environments for things you're doing. go to a library for instance.

2. do fuck all until you almost reach the point of a nervous break down and then use this rush to get to work like a manic freak. only use this technique if it doesn't negatively impact your performance.

  On 4/9/2012 at 6:19 AM, Murveman said:

In my experience, adderall is fantastic (keep in mind I was prescribed with it though).

 

Prolonged use always resulted in paranoia, anxiety, and eventually hyper-focusing on anything for me (got into a car accident due to focusing on a mosquito. Ironically I was re-prescribed for the purpose of being able to focus on driving). It will kill your appetite as well, so be sure to stay nourished.

 

I'd only take it when you need to study or something. My doctor said he drank upwards at least 17 cups of coffee per day to stay focused, and wished that a drug like adderall existed in his day. Edit: Forgot to finish my thought. In conclusion, either drink a fuck-ton of coffee, do adderall, or somehow find some other way of focusing.

OP, avoid any of this. Fuck drugs even if it's just coffe abuse. Unless you'd like to increase heart condition probabilities, getting senile dementia much before the time, or just simply not having control on yourself anymore without the help of some magic substance. Try to avoid also energy drinks, because it's like coffee abuse plus you don't know what else is inside of the can.

I am convinced that nowadays doctors are prescribing adderall, ritalin and such drugs with increasing easiness and superficiality especially in the USA but don't let me start, let's just say it's better at least to leave those medicines to people who are prescribed.

I am here on WATMM because I couldn't concentrate anymore on what I was doing, i.e. studying for the next exam of my BS (I must finish it soon if I want to be eligible for a MSc and am already quite late).

And this brings me to the point. I am quite sure now after some time of mistakes and thoughts, that the thing that is and has been keeping me from achieving my goals for some years now is the Internet.

Before anyone starts calling me a technophobe let me say I am fond of technology and use the Internet extensively, so I am not talking with second-hand knowledge. What I'm implying here is that we are surrounded by distractions and this it has really gone too far.

To work and get things done you have to focus on the task at hand getting rid of anything superfluous, and if you have to study this is even more true.

We are not taking the time to digest what we see and read (and listen to, but I think this one would deserve a whole thead) anymore. And instead of facing the very bad yet invisible menace of information overload we are surrending to this enemy by changing the way we educate our children, by letting the fancy devices enter the schools. Like if our brains could change in the time span of just one generation to keep up with this!

This article is quite old now but nailed the problem.

http://www.internetn...ction+Virus.htm

The Internet is probably the best thing invented by mankind, but the social media are turning out to be bullshit and not because "it lacks physical interaction" but because they're faster and more easily overwhelming than every other form of communication ever existed.

People look busier than ever when you meet them on the street but then anyone loses so much time communicating with smartphones or at home on random websites.

So, if you really care about what you are studying, delete your Facebook account, delete Minecraft, stop watching online TV series forever, decide a time of the day to check emails and this forum and never do it at a different time. Start now.

it's hard to convey how simple and difficult and correct logakht's suggestion is. Just do stuff. Get distracted? Go back to it as soon as you think of it. Exhausted? Take a break. Get distracted? Go back to it. You're only as powerless against your own mind as you let yourself be. The simplest technique is JFDI.

which reminds me of what I'm supposed to be doing right now! thanks! peace out

For the record, I was not suggesting the coffee. I was saying adderall is a better idea than coffee. I also figured my negative review of adderall would be informative. The shit does work though, although it should probably be a last resort.

Surroundings changes have never helped me. Pomodoro sounds like a good idea, will be trying that for the remainder of my school year.

  On 4/9/2012 at 5:06 PM, patternoverlap said:

Find something you are actually excited about doing and do that instead.

this.

however, a big problem are situations where you sell your ass to do some job or something, then find out it's a lethal trap and no way to bail - i'm in such a situation currently and it's the most suck i've ever experienced, a train wreck of a project, a real nightmare, the boss is completely delusional but i need the fucking money. *goto RSS reader*

sometimes i really wish jswift still posted here. his suggestions in a thread like this would be amusing.

he would suggest some sort of bullshit NLP, something like pressing and massaging onto some hotspots in the body or something like that.

its 5 in the morning and im doing engineering essays.

Just good old coffee. Im shit a poker though.

  On 4/10/2012 at 5:27 AM, zaphod said:

sometimes i really wish jswift still posted here. his suggestions in a thread like this would be amusing.

3 times a week, 20 minutes a day. Avoid getting bluky.

But seriously - just do it. I'm in kind of the same boat. 10-12 page research paper due in 12 hours - I've got an opening sentence, a vague idea for a thesis and 3 articles read. lol. fuck it. we'll do it live!

  On 4/10/2012 at 8:19 AM, chenGOD said:

  On 4/10/2012 at 5:27 AM, zaphod said:

sometimes i really wish jswift still posted here. his suggestions in a thread like this would be amusing.

 

3 times a week, 20 minutes a day. Avoid getting bluky.

 

But seriously - just do it. I'm in kind of the same boat. 10-12 page research paper due in 12 hours - I've got an opening sentence, a vague idea for a thesis and 3 articles read. lol. fuck it. we'll do it live!

lol, your ordeal gives me strength

Pro tips:

If u time it right u can flushthe loo before u have ffinnished peeing and them finnish while it flushes u can save a few seconds.

Also ifu walk up stairs 2 at a time u go way faster.

i think getting the thing you're not looking forward to done ffirst i sa good idea.