20 simple things you can do every day to become mindful. It will make your life more conscious!
The world we live in has robbed us of the ability to truly appreciate the little things we should be grateful for. Mindfulness helps us notice details that we ignore due to the hustle and bustle of everyday life. This makes us calmer and saves us from many troubles, making us more productive. We often make mistakes due to our carelessness. However, by practicing mindfulness, we gradually become more aware of what is happening around us. We better understand our own emotions and physical state. This leads to a healthier and happier life.
So how do you become mindful? Read in this post!
Watch your breath
Spend just a couple of minutes a day on this. Inhale longer than usual, then exhale longer. Often decisions are made based on emotions, which is more likely to lead to an undesirable outcome. This practice in such moments will help you calm down, cope with your emotional state and make a rational decision.
How to become attentive and focused: What distracts us?
External stimuli are everything that happens around us and that can be perceived by our senses. Loud music, unpleasant odors, cold or heat, visual disturbances. One of the options for getting rid of external irritants is to remove them or change your place of stay.
Internal stimuli are what happens inside us: our thoughts, internal dialogue, emotions, internal sensations. The most effective way to eliminate these types of problems is to develop the skill of calming the mind and eliminating internal dialogue.
Organize your workspace and your home
Clutter at work or at home can cause anxiety and stress. Getting organized is an easy way to reduce stress and improve your quality of life. Also, in the process of organizing, you improve your attentiveness, since you have to sort out each of your things separately.
That's how absentminded he is!
Stress, overwork, insufficient sleep, lack of fresh air, alcohol abuse, smoking, frequent use of certain medications (especially painkillers, sedatives and sleeping pills), and vitamin hunger often impair memory.
But it’s enough to quit smoking and alcohol, start eating right, going to bed earlier, walking more often and making friends with sports, and episodes of forgetfulness will evaporate as if they never happened. An article on the topic “Brain gymnastics”: 6 exercises for the mind and performance Limiting, by the way, requires not only junk food, but also increased stress. Any overwork (both physical and mental) has a bad effect on the ability to remember, so take breaks from work more often, move more and try not to take work home. You won't earn all the money.
It is also worth limiting unnecessary information. After all, its excess, as is known, leads to superficial perception. So, if you surf the Internet or watch TV from morning to night, then don’t be surprised that your poor brain is no longer able to concentrate on anything else and retain anything important. Give yourself at least one “day off” from gadgets. Try to “forget” your mobile phone and tablet at home for the whole day, and at work do not give in to the temptation to use the Internet outside of work purposes. In the evening, try not to turn on the TV. And you will be surprised at how much calmer you have become and how long and busy the day can be, how much attention you can pay to your loved ones.
Help someone
Research shows that people who help others live more successful lives. They are also less likely to experience stress and depression. Every gesture of attention will be useful: help your family members, help an elderly person cross the road. By doing a small favor for another person, you increase your self-esteem. It makes your life a little better. You realize the purposefulness of life.
How to become attentive and focused: Good habits
- Take breaks . When you feel tired of something, take a break. Your fatigue will distract you and make you less productive.
- Walking in the fresh air will improve your well-being and refresh your mind.
— Try to concentrate on only one thing, no matter what you undertake . Don't let anything distract you. Develop a habit.
— Set priorities . Make a list of your most important tasks, otherwise other tasks will constantly remind you of themselves and distract you. Eliminate nonsense and unimportant tasks.
- Multitasking . No doubt you can do several things at the same time, but in any case the quality suffers. If you want to achieve full concentration, then you need to forget about multitasking.
— Check email and social media updates at specific times . The continuous stream of news will constantly take your attention to little things. Instead of constantly monitoring updates, set aside a specific time.
— Learn to make yourself “unavailable” and set aside specific times when to be “available.” If you are available to other people 24 hours a day, then you will not have time for yourself. Set aside time when you are “unavailable” and devote it only to yourself.
— If the task is complex, divide it . After that, focus on smaller subtasks one at a time. — Set a reminder . At a certain time, when the timer goes off, you ask yourself: what am I doing now? Am I doing nonsense? Am I accomplishing the task?
— Cleaning the workplace . A neat and clean workspace can help improve your organization. When there is nothing unnecessary on it, nothing will distract you.
— Plan your days . By learning to be organized, you learn to concentrate.
— Start a diary . By writing everything down on paper or electronically, you clear your mind of unnecessary reminders and worries.
- Learn to relax . Tension and stiffness impair our perception. Learn relaxation techniques.
- Train your memory . When we have a good memory, we can process information better.
- Close your eyes . If our mind is a computer, then our eyes are cameras. And they are always on. When your eyes are open, your brain is forced to process the information coming from them, which can partially distract us. If the task allows, close your eyes, it may help you.
Meditate
Enjoy the peace after being surrounded by endless distractions. Take some time to do this: put aside everything you are doing, sit in a comfortable position and just focus on your own body. Focus on how each part of your body functions. This will relieve the stress you received during the day.
We are what we eat
Healthy food - mental clarity
— Food fills us with energy , improves our well-being and affects our attention. Some foods can improve your concentration. Proteins, fats and carbohydrates, the norm of vitamins and minerals - all this is necessary for your body, make sure that your diet is balanced.
- Dark chocolate . Contains caffeine (activates the central nervous system), magnesium (helps fight stress) and promotes the release of “happiness hormones”.
- Walnut . It's not for nothing that it looks like our brain.
- Avocado . A wide vitamin and mineral composition helps improve the supply of oxygen to cells.
— Blueberries stimulate the flow of blood and oxygen to the brain . It improves your memory, your focus and attention.
- Green tea . Caffeine improves alertness and theanine calms you down. Both of these substances are found in green tea.
- Fish fat . Omega-3 fatty acid deficiency can lead to poor memory, depression and chronic fatigue. Contained in almost any type of fish, but salmon, trout, mackerel, herring, sardines, etc. have the highest concentration.
- Water . Be sure to drink enough water. It will help you think faster, be more focused, promote mental clarity and creativity.
Take notes
Write down your thoughts in a few words. This is a great way to practice mindfulness and awareness. Just write down what you want to remind yourself of. Keep notes at your workplace or home in a visible place. You could, for example, simply remind yourself to smile or pay attention to what is happening to you right now. Remind yourself of simple gestures that you tend to forget.
Brains, cook!
During our school and student years, we regularly strained our brains: we learned poems and rules, crammed theorems, memorized foreign words, and wrote expositions. But, as adults, we abruptly stopped doing all this. But memory needs regular training. So that it doesn’t let you down, don’t be lazy in memorizing poetry, solving crosswords, learning something new: be it notation or a foreign language.
Article on the topic
Anyone can become a genius, or Who are counter people? Get carried away with puzzles, crosswords, put together puzzles, complete tasks to increase your attentiveness - all this is a great workout for your head. Don't neglect computer games. In particular, such a classic game as “find a pair”, where the player is briefly shown cards with pictures, and then closed and asked to find the pairs. This fun is very useful because it uses parts of the brain important for memory - the temporal lobe and hippocampus. By the way, you can do all this with your children.
In general, doctors believe that memory problems are most often problems with attention. So learn to concentrate. To achieve this, try to get into the habit of not doing anything automatically, but always being collected.
Play sports
Physical activity has a similar effect. And even the most minimal, such as walking.
In their experiment, scientists asked middle school students to solve problems related to concentration in a normal state, after a 20-minute rest and after 20 minutes of walking on a treadmill. Scientists also recorded neuroelectric activity of the brain.
As a result, it was found that the best performance was demonstrated by the group that was engaged in walking. This was confirmed by both tests and EEG data.
7
What is the reason for the lack of composure?
Sometimes it seems that for some lucky people everything comes easy and they cope with many daily tasks with enviable dexterity, managing to go to the gym in the morning, run around the shopping center during the lunch break and choose a gift for a family member, and spend time learning a foreign language in the evening.
At the same time, others do not even have time to rest during the week. If you want to become more focused and organized, stop being distracted and get things done, first try to identify why you are currently not living up to your ideal. What do organization and composure depend on and what to do if you lack them?
Here are some common reasons.
Character
It is believed that by the age of 16 a person’s character is completely formed and it is very difficult to change it in the future. In fact, this is not so - our character changes throughout our lives. True, in order to form the desired habits, you need to make a lot of effort, so time and good motivation are needed. In any case, working on your weaknesses is possible and necessary.
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Inability to navigate in time
This trait is inherent in some people - it is difficult for them to calculate time correctly, especially when they need to go somewhere or complete a large task. This is more typical of psychasthenics than others. In this case, you can try to trick your brain and move the clock forward 15-20 minutes
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Reluctance to perform a specific task
If you don't like a task or task, you can subconsciously sabotage its completion.
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Likewise, if you don’t like the fact that you are basically forced to do something or it’s done by a person you don’t like very much. Sometimes realizing this helps you overcome the barrier
and get to work.
Fear
We often procrastinate on tasks that seem overwhelming or that have previously failed. We are simply afraid of not being able to cope
and therefore we do everything except the main work, which is fraught with a serious loss of time. But if you overcome fear, it will have a great positive effect.
one-minute rule helps with procrastination.
: step over negative emotions and do work for exactly 60 seconds. After time has passed, you will most likely feel inspired and continue to work. Check out these other tips to beat procrastination.
Set your priorities
When you have decided on the things that are coming up today, figure out their importance and priority. You can put down certain labels, for example: 1) needs to be done immediately, 2) planned, 3) delegated, 4) last, if there is enough time. The main thing is not to procrastinate or postpone tasks - such an attitude will only bring unnecessary stress. And you still have to do the necessary work, only later and simultaneously with several other responsibilities. This approach undermines your desire to get organized.
Types of attention
Despite the fact that the process itself is quite simple and understandable, in fact, there are several subtypes of concentration of nerve analyzers depending on the type of stimulus and previously done training that affects its perception. Even if it seems to us that we see and touch everything that is currently happening in front of us, this is just a mistaken opinion; the brain simply cuts off a very large part of the stimuli entering the information processing center. This is a defensive reaction to avoid unnecessary overload and a striking example of this is the fact that after a short time, a person stops smelling his perfume, although it remains throughout the day, or you can notice that there is no constant sensation of a watch on your wrist or a ring on your wrist. finger. Signals from the sensory system have not stopped reaching the processing center, but they have stopped being transmitted to our consciousness.
Involuntary attention
This process does not depend on previously present experience with a given object; it is the most basic type of mindfulness, which extends to everything that happens around a person. Let's say there is a passenger in a car who does not have a driver's license and does not know the meaning of road signs, but he just sees these signs from time to time and they attract his attention - this is called involuntary. Such a process rather depends not on training, but on the speed of reaction of the nervous system, which is influenced by many factors, such as nutrition, the presence of necessary microelements and the development of thinking in general.
Voluntary attention
The result of certain training that allows you not only to notice certain elements, but also to immediately understand their meaning. If we return to our example, such a process is available to the driver of a car, since, thanks to training, he has learned the meaning of road signs and has taught himself to always notice them. He looks at a road sign not because it is an attractive object, but to find out certain restrictions or necessary information on a given section of the road. This also includes the ability to read a certain language. A person not only notices an attractive inscription, but concentrates his attention on what is written there (on the information). Certain mindfulness tasks have an excellent effect on this type of concentration; they are the factor that trains the centers of the nervous analyzers to react to certain objects and not let them pass by our consciousness.
Post-voluntary attention
If we consider the levels of development of attention, then this is the next stage, after voluntary, since to achieve it, you first need to gain certain experience and learn to analyze certain information. After such an experience is repeated with a given person many times and over a short period of time, data analysis can pass by our consciousness and give us only the result. In the existing example, this looks like an experienced truck driver who does not consciously notice some signs, but clearly understands that he is already in a populated area and adheres to a different speed limit. The same thing happens with a person. If he reads books a lot, he can just skim the page without focusing his attention on what is written, but he already gets a picture of what is happening. The development of attention of this type directly depends on gaining experience in the previous type.
