Looking for natty ways to improve my concentration

>I am only able to read a book just one or two hours a day
This is more than 90% of /lit/
The standard is very low here

>>9310999

>>9310896
>Basically my concentration is shit and I am only able to read a book just one or two hours a day.
This is a normal amount of time to spend reading a book every day (for the average person).

Have you tried exercising for a few hours then reading after you've cooled down?

>>9311065
>Have you tried exercising for a few hours then reading after you've cooled down?
No, what do you suggest? Lifting or cardio?

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>>9311171
Mountain biking if you can, no music, just forest -- whizzing along fast enough that you MUST pay attention, whereas on a walk your mind can wander.
skiing is good, too
and so is surfing, unless the beach is backed by a city.

try somewhere like pic related

>>9311171
Whichever one you are more likely to commit to. A lot of autismos will jump in with all the benefits of weightlifting or cardio but at the end of the day the one you stick with is better than the one you don't.

I've done both and I've felt more relaxed immediately after a heavy weightlifting session but I'm able to swim for two hours and after that I am calm for a longer period of time. The point isn't really to get physical improvement so much as give your body something to blow a lot of energy on so you can actually focus.

Don't be offended but this is why they let tards run around as soon as they get to school. It's so they can blow off steam after being cooped up in a car or bus. My brother in the marines tells me they do the same thing while taking classes, every hour or so they just go do pullups or some shit. I try to do something similiar where I'll do some squats, leg raises, or pushups after reading or working for an hour.

>>9310896

Mindfulness. It's getting wrongfully memed by a lot of fags as a panacea, but in regards to concentration, it's been proven to work, and very, very quickly at that:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20363650

>>9311171
Cardio is really good for concentration, its stimulates the dopamine system in your brain
Cardio + meditation and then reading is god tier

>>9311237
I just don't understand meditation at all.
As in what the fuck do you do?

Do you just sit and try to quiet your mind? Do you sit and just let thoughts wash over you but just ignore them and keep still? How do you sit without it raping your back? Every god damned book or video I have seen contradicts one another.

>>9311703

You sit, typically in a designated pose, and let your thoughts come and go.

By "designated pose" I mean one where you're usually meant to hold up like three or four things at once (crown of your head being pushed as high as possible, back straight, delicate positioning of fingers, and all controlled breathing). This has the effect of keeping you spinning plates as you're constantly losing grip of one or another thing, so you're always "returning to the pose." This unto itself is focus building.

The meat and potatoes of meditation is that as far as thoughts go, you simply watch them come in. You don't try to "think" on them, you don't try to "judge" them. That is, if a bad thought comes in, you don't beat yourself up about it (and you certainly don't beat yourself up about beating yourself up). You just watch them come and go. Slowly, you realize that you aren't the thoughts you're made up of, that they're just these weird muddy churns of the river, but that with enough practice, you can kind of direct as you shall

>>9311703
Focus on your breathing and merely observe your thoughts and let them dissipate (as in don't "ride" along with them in a train of though)

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>>9311727
what the fuck pose is that tho?
Indian style? Pic related?

>>9311806
Listen to the Sam Harris guided meditation, it ought to help you out.

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>>9310896

listen you mfer..... you have to work out your reading muscles.... bitch...........

>natty

dont use buzzwords if you dont know what they mean desu

>>9312065
/thread

>>9311924
Every time I hear his voice I feel like I've just been molested.

>>9312081
>dont use buzzwords
>desu
>/thread

the only thing that helps is to go a day or two without the internet every once in a while. like a weekend or something. or you could modify it to just using the internet strictly for like school mail or whatever for a few days.

>>9311171
Lifting will give you a huge boost of energy and motivation to get things done especially if you do it early in the day and get enough food. Same with no fap.

>>9311237
Maybe its just me, meditation left me in an uncomfortable disassociative state. Took me forever to feel 'grounded' again.

How do I stop my mind from wandering off in the middle of each sentence? This is reading anything - even the most interesting, fascinating content and things I actually want to read. I can't focus for shit.

>>9314899
how much time do you spend on the internet
where do your thoughts wander to

>>9313985
What effect does the internet have on concentration? Has this ever been researched by scientists? I'm curious.

>>9315364
yeah the book "the shallows: what the internet is doing to our brains" cites specific studies about internet use re-wiring your brain, diminishing capacity for deep concentration but broadening the ability to multi-task.

as a result you are able to do more things at once and perhaps perceive more things at once, but your capacity for deep and long thinking and concentration (like the kind where you "lose yourself" in a book or whatever) is gradually destroyed

its a bit extreme but the author says that maybe deep studying and reading will once again become a thing only the elites have the ability to do because only they will be the ones who retain ability to concentrate

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>>9310896
Pomodoro method: 25 minutes focus time, 5 minutes break then start over again. Using this method I can sit down and do work/read from 10pm to 4am.

I use this app called Tide for timing and recording my focus time. There are plain Pomodoro apps out there that only times you too.

Check out this lasagna I made the other day. I have no friends nor family to care about my small accomplishments.

>>9315830
woah - nice lasagna

>>9315830
neat lasagna my man, but shit photo