Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
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Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#2tl;dr
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#3Mental attention, she notes, is selective. Like a flashlight beam, we aim our consciousness on but a thin slice of what surrounds us. At a party, for instance, we hear only one voice among many until another voice speaks our name and our attention suddenly shifts.
I find myself to be much the opposite. I have trouble focusing on on any one conversation, I'm too easily distracted. I can't hold a phone call or conversation while a TV is playing at similar volume. In a restaurant, I feel like I hear all conversations and the music, and I can't seem to shut them out. It's not that I'm listening to all the conversations, but I hear them, and it makes focusing on the conversation I'm trying to hold difficult.
With programming and reading, however, I do find that I can shut out background noise, and I suspect this is because it's a different kind of thinking than what distractions around would be causing.
I suspect that because the attention is given to a mode of thought (reading, programming), and that that mode is not competing with other forms of the same mode (I'm not trying to read two books simultaneously), that this enables someone (or maybe just me, I dunno) to shut off the other senses. While with listening and hearing multiple conversations, it's like trying to read and having random words getting thrown into the sentences you're reading.
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#4Mental attention, she notes, is selective. Like a flashlight beam, we aim our consciousness on but a thin slice of what surrounds us. At a party, for instance, we hear only one voice among many until another voice speaks our name and our attention suddenly shifts. I find myself to be much the opposite. I have trouble focusing on on any one conversation, I'm too easily distracted. I can't hold a phone call or conversa…
I know what you mean - I have the same problem. For me, it's worst with television: I can't have a conversation with someone if there's a TV on in the same room. I'm not sure if this is the opposite to the flashlight simile, or just an example of an inability to direct it at will.
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#5Mental attention, she notes, is selective. Like a flashlight beam, we aim our consciousness on but a thin slice of what surrounds us. At a party, for instance, we hear only one voice among many until another voice speaks our name and our attention suddenly shifts. I find myself to be much the opposite. I have trouble focusing on on any one conversation, I'm too easily distracted. I can't hold a phone call or conversa…
I know what you mean - I have the same problem. For me, it's worst with television: I can't have a conversation with someone if there's a TV on in the same room. I'm not sure if this is the opposite to the flashlight simile, or just an example of an inability to direct it at will.
I'm glad I'm not alone :)
Interestingly, I find that this tends to affect the men of my family more than the women. My mom, sister, and wife don't seem to have this problem at all. While both my dad and brother all suffer from an inability to hold a conversation if the TV is on.
Of course, that's a pretty small sample set.
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#6Nice article, but like many things, this just touches the surface and adds little enlightment.
Being really good at many things, especially programming, requires deep involvement. This is the polar opposite of "posing".
It's easy to pose and talk about eyeballs or algorithms or third normal form. But tell me what data is in column 4, which programs change it under which conditions, and what that effects. That takes deep understanding. Which takes focus.
If it were easy, everyone would be doing it.
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#7I must admit I like having some time off too, away from all those distractions. But on the other hand, if I don't have my cellphone, emails, meetings, ... I often feel out of control because I don't know the status of issues.
I like to think there is a time for everything, and as said in the article, I think people with ADD sometimes just don't manage that time correctly. Of course I'm not saying ADD doesn't exist, but sometimes I do think it seems to be(come) a real buzzword for some people.
And it seems logical to me people tend to find it hard to be focused, we are living in a fast world, maybe sometimes too fast and demanding...
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#8The Richard Wiseman color-changing card trick
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voAntzB7EwE
is a good example of selective attention.
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#9Rob May* wrote this three years ago about the same topic:
Is Concentration the New Competitive Advantage?: http://www.businesspundit.com/is-concentration-the-new-compe...
He goes onto saying how reading every Digg post, or looking at every new Web 2.0 startup is basically a complete waist of time.
You feel like you're actually learning something, but in reality the info you're learning is "junk" knowledge (unless you're a VC looking for an investment opportunity - but by the time it hits TechCrunch or Digg, it's probably too late to invest anyway).
*Rob no longer writes for BusinessPundit.com. He's at CoconutHeadsets.com now.
Re: Why it is so hard to stay focused these days—and what to do about it
#10Mental attention, she notes, is selective. Like a flashlight beam, we aim our consciousness on but a thin slice of what surrounds us. At a party, for instance, we hear only one voice among many until another voice speaks our name and our attention suddenly shifts. I find myself to be much the opposite. I have trouble focusing on on any one conversation, I'm too easily distracted. I can't hold a phone call or conversa…
I have the same problem, so I've had to do things to cope with it. Fortunately, I have an office with a door at my work now, and that helps tremendously. At home I have a room to work in where I can shut the door and not hear the TV. When I need to concentrate, I shut down the Twitter, E-mail, and IM clients, and any other things on my computer that might be distracting. I only run programs related to the task at hand.
I have also found that a daily time of quiet prayer and meditation is helpful. If you don't believe in prayer, some other kind of meditation will probably help, too. Lately I've been incorporating MP3s from pray-as-you-go.org, which are very well done short sessions of Ignatian guided meditation incorporating beautiful music.