Focus

I want to open this post by inviting you to make this a national day of service, in memory of the people whose lives were lost on 9/11/01. If you are working or going to school today, I encourage you to participate by finding small ways to serve others through random, or not so random, acts of kindness. 

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College demands mental toughness, especially the ability to focus for longer stretches of time. There are more pages to be read and papers to be written, experiments and problem sets to complete, with no one forcing you to sit down and get it done. Put this along side our hyper-digital, hyper-connectedness, and you have a near guarantee of slow-to-no-progress and the makings of a PhD in procrastination.

"Focus," says sports psychologist Terry Orlick, "is the first and most important element of success" (11). He believes that to perform at our best, we have to train ourselves to focus more often and more effectively. To do this, he recommends what he calls a "distraction control plan" (94), which looks like this:

1. Make a list of the most common distractions, whatever prevents you from studying or getting homework done.
2. Identify your usual way of responding to these distractions.
3. If your response is taking you away from your work, brainstorm a new way of responding that will allow you to stay focused.
4. Create a positive word or phrase that will help you to refocus.

    I recommend starting small. Don't expect to study for five hours straight each night, especially since most studies suggest that paying attention for this long is humanly impossible. Try not to dwell on ALL the work you have to get done. Instead, figure out what needs to be done first and try to devote yourself to that completely. When I start to get wigged out by my to do list, one of my favorite mantras is "one thing at a time." I've also been known to say, "I can do this. I have a college degree." These are pretty obvious, pretty boring really, but they work. Maybe I'll try something more exciting in the future. If you hear me say, "Mush, rodeo clown, make it happen!" You will know I'm tweaking my refocusing methods.

What about you? What can you do to minimize distractions and maximize your focus? Work through the steps above and try a new way of responding to distractions during your next study session. Just try it for one day. Then, write a blog post discussing the highs and lows of your experience with Orlick's Distraction Control Plan. 

Works Cited

Orlick, Terry. In Pursuit of Excellence. Champaign: Human Kinetics, 2008. Print.