How to Get Your Brain to Focus—TED Record

First of all, I want to say is in order to improve my English listening and wirting skills, I decide to create this series to record my daily English learning process.

I hope that with my efforts, English can become my second tongue.

Original Video Address: click here

New Word Record

omelette : 煎蛋卷
pan : 平底锅
devil : 魔鬼
wrist : 腕、腕关节
dastardly : 懦弱的、卑微的
podcast : 播客
span : 跨度、横跨区间
ease : 减轻、缓和、安心
pore : 细想、熟读
memos : 备忘录
flew out : 飞出形容非常急切
slack : 松弛的、懈怠的
overstimulated : 过度刺激
crave : 渴望、渴求
tiny : 极小的、微小的
nugget : 金块
novelty : 新奇的、新颖的
dopamine : 多巴胺
stimulate : 刺激、激励
boredom : 厌倦
baggage : 行李
claim : 主张、断言
baggage claim : 行李认领
reservation : 保留、预定
quote : 引用、引述
strike : 罢工、打击、敲击
constellation : 星座、杰出的人物
swirl : 旋涡、围绕
materialize : 具体化、成为现实
delicate : 微妙的、易碎的
prospective : 未来的、前景的、预期的
stereotypic : 刻板印象
knit : 编织
notepad : 记事本、笔记本
masseuse : 女按摩师
session : 会议、学期、开会
ritual : 仪式、礼仪、习惯
dive : 跳水、潜水、冥思

Content

Because lecturer can’t do without his phone all the time, he can’t focus on doing any single thing. So he decide to leave his phone 30 minutes every single day at a maximum. And he observed what happened during this time. It took about a week to adjust downward into a new lower level of simulation.

But once he did, he noticed that three curious things began to happen.

Attention span grew 持续专注时间增长
More plans
More thoughts

How does technology influence our attention and our ability to focus?

We focus on one thing for just 40 seconds before we switch to doing something else, and when we in state of slack, this time even lower to 35 seconds.

problem: our brains are rather distracted than overstimulated, it’s we crave distraction.
We want to get dopamine from the entertainment of phone, so we not only crave distraction, but our mind reward us for seeking out and finding distraction in the first place.

figure.1

figure.2

horizontal axis is time，above these two pictures, we can see if we control ourselves to contact those electronical devices, with the grow of time, the simluation will drop down. We call this process “boredom”.

“Not all those who wander are lost” —— J.R.R.Tolkien （不是所有踌躇的人都迷失了方向）

“ScatterFocus”

Past: 12% of the time
Present: 28% of the time
Future: 48% of the time

Three Shifts

We don’t need to fit more in, we are doing enough, we are doing too much. We need more space.
Think the distraction is not the emey of focus. But the overstimulation is the emey of focus.
If we distraced in each moment, those moment of distraction and overstimulation build up and accumulate to create a life that feels more distracted and overwhelming, like we don’t have a clear dirextion. But when we become less stimulated when we make our mind more calm, we get the benfits of added productivity and focus and ideas and creativity, but we also live a better lift because of it.

One Challenge

Use two weeks to limit screen time disconnection ritual/day rediscover boredom scatterfocus.