How to improve focus and concentration

 

whenever we try to focus on something our mind starts to get distracted. The majority of people suffer from this distraction problem. The efficiency of our work done depends upon our focus. According to Harvard University, 47% of us spend our time daydreaming and this happens due to less concentration and focus. The more we lose our focus the saddle will be. you might have heard a saying called "A wandering mind is an unhappy mind". Due to distraction problem, our easy task also becomes hard. It becomes necessary to get rid of distraction and increase focus in an order to make our life better. I am going to help you to achieve this task by sharing few points from the Book Hyper Focus ву By CHRIS Bailey. In this book, the author has given various reason for distraction and ways to overcome it.

How to boost concentration

Improved concentration can be helpful for you in many ways. The author says that our brain is only responsible for our distraction. He has shared Three points In which he explains the case of Distraction and ways to overcome it.

1) Attention is limited

university of Virginia professor Timothy Wilson Conducted research in which he found that our brain receives 11 Million Bits of Information in every second but out of it our brain can process only 40 Bits of Information in a second. It means that our brain receives a lot of data but processes only a few of it. It is the only reason that we find difficult to talk to two different people on a two different topic at the same time.

Imagine If you are talking to your friend when it's your friends turn to speak your brain will receive all the information that your friend is saying. The second thing that you will do brain will do is it will connect all the information from your past event and the information he has. The third thing that he will do is it will prepare the reply to give to your friend. When all the processing is done you will start to reply to your friend. Now your brain will focus on your friend's body language and his reaction. When all these processes occur in our brain consumes some space and that space is called "Attentional space". The mental capacity required to digest a process with a focus is called "Attentional space".

How to work efficiently with focus

Attentional space is just like RAM in our phone. The higher the Attentional space higher will be your focus. Imagine now your focus is on two different tasks which are filling your attentional space. The first task is that you are reading this post and the second task is that you have to study. Now you can perform both tasks easily but as you increase the number of task in your attentional space your brain will not be able to focus on any of the tasks completely. When you focus on one task at a time you become very productive.

2) switching off the autopilot mode

When the Author was noticing his behaviour he found that whenever he was doing something important work his mind was diverted towards his mobile phone. when Author talked to a mental and scientific health professor he got to know that there is a scientific reason behind this distraction phenomenon to which the Author calls Autopilot Mode.

During Autopilot mode our brain automatically starts to go towards the distracting things and on which you have, no Control. To Switch off Autopilot Mode Author suggest us a Task which he says that we should divide our daily task into four categories

1) Necessary work
The productive task but unattractive are necessary work. If you are a student then your necessary work includes Studying and completing Assignment etc.

2) unnecessary work
The task which is unproductive and unattractive is called unnecessary work. These task does not contribute to any growth in your life. This task includes work like gossiping about Celebrities, Talking to your friend whom you don't like. you perform this task to escape from necessary work.

3) Distracting work
The task which is unproductive but is attractive is called Distracting work. This is the task that again stops you from doing Necessary work. Distracting work includes task like using Social media, watching Netflix, etc. This all comes under distracting work. These are the works that gives you instant Gratification that's why we want to do these things.

4) Purpose full work
A task that is both productive and attractive are purposeful work and this is the work that most impact your life. This work includes task like reading books, spending time with family, and performing exercises, etc.

Now the most important thing is that most productive and happy people spend most of their time doing necessary and purposeful work and the unsuccessful people give their most time to unnecessary and Distracting work. which you should not do.

3) The Bias

Research shows that when we keep our phone near to us and perform some other task then for forty seconds only we will be able to focus on one thing after that there is a chance that we get distracted. Maximum people think that Distraction is the main problem But experts say that Distraction is just a symptom of a problem.

New research shows that our brain is not distracted but is overstimulated means our brain does not get distracted but instead, it chases the distraction because the human brain and always need a piece of new information it wants new experiences which are called Novelty. Social media feeds Tv, games whom people think that they are distraction gives b Novelty to our brain which releases dopamine. This mechanism of the brain is called Novelty bias which makes us feels happy. We need to understand one thing that our brain main focus is never on our task it's main focus is always on distractions because it likes Distraction.

less Mobile use

The Author was suffering from a problem of less attention span. He found that most of the time was wasted on his Mobile. To find a solution to this problem Author decided a use a trick to which he named 1month no mobile use.  The author decreased his use of mobile. He started to use his mobile-only for 30 minutes a day in which he was doing all his important work like Calling, texting messages and hearing music. He performed this for one month and he found three important changes in himself.
1) His attention span was increased.
2) He started to get unique ideas.
3) He was able to think about his future more clearly.