5 Activities That Improve Focus and Concentration

In today’s world full of distractions, it’s getting more and more difficult to focus and make things done. Once you start trying, the email comes or a friend texts you on Facebook and here you are, surfing the Web for another two hours.

Luckily, there are activities that improve focus and concentration, proved by scientists and thousands of people who have already won this war with distractions and became focused on their life. In today’s article, you will find the tips and strategies that you can use while studying or working to increase your effectiveness, reduce the time you spend on your tasks and just feel better and more concentrated.

Exercise

To keep your mind fit and focused, start with your body first. According to research, physical activities have a lot to do with improving concentration. So if you are about to have an important meeting, a school test or some other event that requires focus and good memory power, make several squats or push-ups instead of having another cup of coffee.

It would be even more effective if you make a short outdoor run that is considered to be one of the best ways to improve concentration. But don’t get it too far — all you need is a short exercise series and not an exhausting training because it will reverse the effect.

Meditate

If you are not into physical exercises or just short of time but still want to improve memory and concentration, meditation is what can be good for you. It’s hard to miss that it has become a new trend. New meditation apps are being released every month, famous startuppers confirm meditation to be their key to success, and looks like this increased popularity is fueled by the serious reasons.

It is said that meditation can have both short-term and long-term effect on your memory skills and general ability to focus. As a short-term medium, it can help you get rid of distractions and focus on a task you are doing and in a long-term perspective, meditation can substantially improve your attention.

You can experiment with different techniques, methods, and time spans to find your own way to the best concentration effect. If you find it difficult to start meditating by yourself, you can reach out to the professional meditation coaches that can easily be found in big cities like Calgary where the pace of life makes it hard to stay calm even for a few minutes.

Make plans

Sometimes, you can’t concentrate just because you have a lot of things to do and can’t decide which one you should start with. Planning is one of those activities to improve concentration that doesn’t take much time to do but can be very helpful. Make it a routine to make plans for a day, for a week and for a month.

To make it more interesting and entertaining, buy a nice planner book and a bunch of stickers or use a smartphone app if you are more into electronic kind of things. The next step after the plan is made is to follow it and this is actually the hardest part. Make sure you are doing only one item on the plan at a time and don’t start doing anything until you are finished with the previous task.

For some reason, multitasking is considered a good thing and you could even include it in your CV among your professional advantages but, in fact, doing several things in the meantime seriously harms your productivity. So if you are wondering how to improve concentration and focus, stop multitasking and start writing your to-do lists right now.

Drink

And no, we are not talking about coffee and energy drinks that are mistakenly taken as the concentration helpers thanks to the advertisement. Surprisingly, the lack of fluid in your body can also lead to distracted attention. You may think you are hungry or just tired but in reality, all you need to come back to work is a glass of clear water. If water is not among the tastiest things to improve concentration for you, there are other liquids that can help:

• home-made lemonade (mix water with your favorite citruses and a handful of mint, add a drop of honey or stevia syrup);
• coconut water;
• green tea;
• hot ginger tea.

So next time your co-worker calls you for a lunch or a coffee break, better bring your own thermos with a helpful drink so that you can stay more focused even in the afternoon.

Play

Our brain is not a regular muscle but you can still train it to be more concentrated and memorize much more things. And you don’t even need the fitness equipment for it, just the games for improving memory and concentration.

The brain games can be helpful both for children and grown-ups and are not only fun to play but also can help a lot. You can download special games to improve concentration from the Internet and hold a competition during your next team-building event: make several teams and look who is doing better.

Or bring the games to the real life and go to the escape quest. The closed room full of puzzles and riddles immediately affects your brain so it’s getting faster, sharper and more focused. Going to the real life escape games once or twice a month can be a good mental training and it’s probably the most entertaining way to concentrate.

As you can see, the question «How to improve concentration?» have very simple answers that will not take much time and efforts to implement. But with these simple steps, you can easily make your working or studying process more productive. Five simple activities — physical and mental exercises, meditation, planning and drinking enough water are your best escape set on the way to the focused and better life.