How can I trick my brain to concentrate for longer periods? I have a sort of Attention Deficit and it is impossible to do so.

As I lay in bed last night, I had this sense of confidence that tomorrow wasn’t just going to be another day, but the day I began to stop procrastinating on improving my german skills.

I had visited some blogs advising  ” you just need to  show up, remove external distractions and  focus would come itself“. So it cames down to working on german the next morning, I thought turning off my phone was enough. However there was an anomaly:

• “What am I going to eat tonight?”  I asked myself 3 minutes after getting started
  
• ” Shit  I am getting sidetrack”. I reset the timer.
• Just After I thought ” OK let us eat the frog NOW ” some ideas pops up in my mind
• ” What about visiting Angela this weekend, I might bring a cake..”   “Hum this is important, I should take note now, otherwise, It might forget it”.

15 min later ,  I was still brainstorming ideas . that had nothing to do with lerning german.

• “I’ve tried everything possible but it just isn’t working. Let’ us take a break and come back to continue later”
• At that moment, an  innner voice reacted : “You are lying. you know you will never come back again. How many times have you said that before and did nothing afterwards? “
•  “don’t worry, this time I am on fire”, My procrastinator mind replied.

We all know how it ends.

Does it sound familiar to you? How many times did you feel like focusing on the job was much harder than doing the job?

What is the problem?

Lesson 1: Setting up timer and turning off external distractions are useful but not enough  for people with Attention Deficit

We naturally have the habit of  jumping from one topic to another.  That’s why classical advice don’t prevent us  against thoughts that seems so attractive and disconnect us from the current activity.

For instance, turning OFF your phone won’t prevent you from  thinking about Facebook, Whatsap or any other platform you hope receiving a message from.

Lesson 2:  internal distraction have a more destructive power than external distractions.

There is a huge difference between what your conscious mind  want to do and what your unconscious mind is looking for. The lack of focus and the mental resistance come from  their disagreement. Repeating to your self “ I should do this, I should do that ” is worthless.

Solution: Use unconscious focus

TO begin with, you need to understand there are two types of focus: the first one corresponds to your conscious mind (The conscious focus = your will power) and the second corresponds to your unconscious mind (unconscious focus = where your internal distraction points).

Your conscious mind and unconscious mind act as a team. Always start by making them agree together when trying to achieve any task you might consider difficult. Otherwise, you will feel a huge internal resistance because of inner conflict. That is why you find it hard to concentrate and get sidetrack.

Before you start, draw an image of the topic, put it on your left, and visualize it for 1 min. The energy you spend drawing the image is far less than the energy you would spend fighting against internal distractions later.

You will observe how easy to “get IN ” the task. Your mind will calm down and your thoughts will be lined to the topic. You won’t feel overwhelmed by conflicting thinking.
The detailed process goes like this:

Step 1 hand write your goal 3 times at least

Don’t make the mistake to say ”I know my objective, I don’t have time to write this.”. You don’t know. It will force you to clarify  your intention about where you want to go.

Step 2  draw the first image that comes out from your mind about the topic you want to achieve

it doesn’t matter if the image is bad. do it even if it is weird. What is important is you do it with your hand. A printed picture also work but it is less memorable than a picture you do yourself.

Step 3 put it on your left eye’s side

Make sure there is no any other image on your left eye side.

Step 4 look at this image (countdown internally until 70 )

Locking in. Don’t miss it.

Step 5 start working on the activity. Put any development you do in your right side.

Doing so you are telling your unconscious mind that there are of less priority than hour target on your left. This prevent you from investigating  ramifications of new ideas so deeply  that you forget and abandon the main goal.

If your attention wanders, just look at the picture again from time to time to easily get back on track.

Heudou Tchihikou Aubin 

A master chronic procrastinator who chose to execute on his dreams because of frustration and self criticism