David Hewitt - Focus: Best Ways To Improve Your Concentration and Improve Your Learning

Chapter 1: Techniques to Improve Concentration

In this chapter we shall cover somemethods and techniques to help you improve your concentration. These are simplebut effective steps that will go a long way to aid you focus on the tasks athand without being taxing or difficult to put into effect. However, pleaseunderstand that improving your concentration is not something that will happenovernight, you have to be consistent and regular in the application of themethods given below, for them to bear fruit.

In order to improve anything, youmust first have a clear understanding of what it is. What is concentration? Inthe simplest form of explaining, it is nothing but the ability to take yourmind off multiple things and devote your complete focus and attention to thesingular task at hand.

As mentionedearlier, it is very important to decide and finalize the matter on which youwish to concentrate. The decision making part has to be done properly. You maybe faced with a lot of issues that require your attention, but out of suchissues you have to prioritize and select the one that is the most urgent.

Now there are somepeople who can focus and work despite having loud music playing in thebackground or with the television on, but for the vast majority of others whocannot do so, it is very important to make sure that there are no externalfactors to distract you. The principle here is to avoid what is called the"sensory overload". It has been showed in many researches thatthe average human being can concentrate better when the number of sensoryinputs is minimal. And if you can't get to a quiet place, learn to shut yourmind towards the distraction.

The key to attainingfocus is to elevate the particular task in front of you to the most importantstatus, and thereby give it your full. This sense of priority that you attachto anything will involuntarily help you concentrating better.

Concentration stemsfrom a calm mind. Don't be jittery when face with a task. And this hasmore to do with the principles of good and bad energy. When you staycalm, positive and creative energy flows through you, whereas, when you panic,the distractive negative energy deters you from being focused on the job athand.

You may have heardthis countless times before, that you should take a break at regular intervalsto be more productive. And let's just reinstate that fact here. It is actuallytrue and holds good especially for people who have trouble in concentrating.Medical research has proved it beyond doubt that the attention span of anaverage person does not exceed an hour and a half at a stretch.

Take frequent breaks, go out or walkto the window and take a breath of fresh air to rejuvenate your senses. Have acoffee or some light snack and think about something completely unrelated tothe work you were doing prior to the break. This is very important, if you keepthinking over the same issue over and over again, even during the break time,the very idea of taking the break is made redundant.

Learn to control theflow of energy through your body. The concept here is simple, as mentionedearlier, positive energy helps you focus and concentrate more while negativeenergy does the opposite to you. This flow of energy can be controlled by youto a large extent. It does take a lot of time to figure this out and master it,but it is by no way unattainable. The key here is to understand what makes youfeel positive and content and then making sure that you are, in some way, inthe presence of that factor when working. Similarly stay away from thevariables that give a sense of foreboding or make you feel unhappy.

We have saved thebest for the last. Meditation can be the most effective tool to help you focusbetter and concentrate. Consider it as the most powerful weapon in yourarsenal. Learn at least a few meditation techniques and make sure that youpractice them daily for a minimum of half an hour to one hour.

And when you do meditation, watchthe breathing. Many half-baked theories suggest that you should take consciouseffort to control your breathing while meditating. But is not so, infact, instead of controlling it, just let it be. Simply observe the way you arebreathing. This helps you to focus as well.

The following five tips can help youto learn how to concentrate, no matter what environment you are working in:

F = Five More

There are two different types ofpeople those who have learnt how to get round frustration and those whodearly wish that they had. This one is for you if you are halfwaythrough doing something and you fell like throwing in the towel, do just fivemore.

Five more minutes, read five morepages, finish five more letters, whatever it is just do five more before yougive up and give in. This is a technique used by many different people indifferent walks of life. Athletes use it to push themselves past exhaustionpoint or through the pain barrier and you can use it to build up yourconcentration and focus by pushing past frustration.

Give it a go youll find that,once you get past a certain point, your brain will kick into gear again and yourfocus will come back.

O One Think at a Time

If I look confused, its becauseIm thinking Samuel Goldwyn

Do you feel as though you arecompletely disorganized and cannot concentrate? Is it because your mindis usually on several other things at once, leaving you no room to focus onwhat really needs to be done? Use the Godfather plan to overcome it andmake your mind a deal it simply cant refuse.