Improving Your Ability to Pay Attention

Day in and day out, we plunge ourselves into a mad rush of activity, and the resulting brain overload has led to the point where our entire society is suffering from attention deficit. Attention is as complex as the weather -- influenced by many factors -- but it's much easier to change. It's not an on/off thing, either. During a typical day, your attention goes through many gradations as white does on its way to black and back. Genetics influence attention, and you can't control that, but with work you can keep attention where you want it most of the time.

Here are some steps you can take to improve your ability to pay attention:

1. Get Enough Sleep

• • • • • • • • The first -- both the most basic and the most important -- is to get enough sleep. The desired amount is how much sleep it takes to wake up without an alarm. For most adults, this is in the neighborhood of eight hours a night. If you are not getting enough sleep, consider doing an experiment. For two weeks, change your schedule so that you are in bed early enough to get eight hours of sleep. By the end of the two weeks, you should notice that: -you have more energy -you don't need your alarm clock -you have more focus -you feel better physically The overall result should be a positive impact on your ability to pay attention.

For more by Edward M. Hallowell, M.D.,click here.

For more on emotional wellness, click here.

 

Comments

[all im sayin is]

11:01 AM on 06/13/2012

Huh? What as this story about? And where am I?

[C Karen Stopford]

08:47 AM on 06/13/2012

Good suggestions; my only criticism is that the idea of building more variety into one's career only applies to those who are fortunate enough to a) actually have employment, and b) have the type of job that does not require repetition, and c) are given the latitude on the job to determine how the work will be done. That's a pretty tall order in today's economy.