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Concentration, Distraction & Focus

Intro: Reading

From The Art of Mindful Reading: Embracing the wisdom of words, by Ella Berthoud. Recognizing what type of reader of fiction you are can help deepen your reading experience. 

Auditory Readers benefit from reading aloud or being read to. Creating unique voices for passages of dialog or varying one's voice for dramatic effect has an impact on the reading experience. 

Visual Readers benefit from books that have a strong visual theme so as to enter most fully in to the fictional world. When reading, ponder each image longer than you normally would to create the setting in your mind. 

Kinesthetic Readers benefit from allowing one's body to move. 

Create a reading space, spot or nook that suits you and attracts you to the place. 

 

 

 

 

YOUR ATTENTION, PLEASE! How long can we use willpower to force ourselves to pay attention to something that’s not interesting? 

It's alarming when posts say people's attention spans are only 30 seconds long. That's just silly. If people's attention spans were that short, nobody would be able to drive in traffic or make it through a Lord of the Rings movie. So where does this idea come from?

Learn More: Reading

Best selling author James Clear, "Focus is all about saying yes to one option and no to all the others."
“Most people don’t have trouble with focusing. They have trouble with deciding,” says Clear.  He asks if you notice how deadlines tend to focus your energy and efforts? It’s because urgency forces you to abandon unimportant, shallow work to focus deeply on the work you need to get done. But how do we improve focus when there are no deadlines?
 
For fans of country singer Tim McGraw, consider his take on mindfulness in his book Grit & Grace: Train The Mind, Train The Body, Own Your Life where he offers inspiration for those who want to improve themselves physically and mentally. One specific takeaway: end the chatter in our minds. 
Many Christian Science Monitor articles feature "TWO WAYS TO READ THE STORY"
 Quick Read / Deep Read (with minute estimate)  
 
Some articles have a scrolling progress bar, like the elapsed time bar on a YouTube video, indicating how much you have read in the article. For an excellent example, scroll down on this article then look for the thin blue progress bar across the top of the page:  https://peterattiamd.com/the-killers-on-the-road-reducing-your-risk-of-automotive-death/
 
Here are html code tips to create "Scroll Indicator" bars.  

10 minute interview with author and scholar Naomi Baron about our "Always On" culture. 

Google Effects on Memory: Cognitive Consequences of Having Information at Our Fingertips

How Do I Stop Forgetting What I Learned So Quickly?​

Deep Dive: Reading