Mastering Focus: 106 Insights for Effective Study Habits and Enhanced Concentration
Tags: studyhabits, focustechniques, effectivelearning, concentrationtips
Published: 2024-02-03 14:23:02

These points are a compilation of my learnings from various sources, including [Learning How to Learn](https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn), [Ready, Study, Go!: Smart Ways to Learn](https://www.amazon.in/Ready-Study-Go-Smart-Learn/dp/9352641345), [Secret of Concentration](https://www.vivekanandabookworld.com/product-page/secret-of-concentration#:~:text=This%20small%20booklet%20is%20a,in%20the%20practice%20of%20concentration.), and [Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World](https://www.amazon.in/Deep-Work-Focused-Success-Distracted/dp/0349413681). This blog or links given are not monetized, and all credit goes to the original authors. I highly recommend readers to purchase these courses/books for further learning.



1. Healthy body is the first step. Good diet, exercise/yoga/meditation is necessary.
2. The mind is incredibly powerful at manifesting things you want, But it is also innocent and cannot differentiate between desire and fear or an aversion. And that's exactly why making intention clear is important so that you can tell clearly to mind, what to focus on. The mind latches on most powerful words - "fail" or "great" in this instance and manifest that for you. You should not have many intentions at the same time.
3. Anything that is claimed to be a "quick fix" most definitely is not.
4. Study for knowledge, not for marks. If you have knowledge, you will get the marks.
5. No subject can be boring or uninteresting. When you have thoroughly understood subjects, when you have grasped the fundamentals and are confident about your knowledge of it, then education has truly happened.
6. If you are only studying for great marks, you may possibly get a head start in life, but the people who truly understand their subjects will overtake you.
7. You will need to memorize a lot of information, There is nothing wrong with that as long as you understand what you are memorizing.
8. If we decide to like a subject, it grows on us. What you like and not like is your decision, and you can change it anytime. Take responsibility for what's happening in your mind and in your life. Only you can fix it.
9. 20-30 minutes of completely uninterrupted focused work can do wonders. [Pomodoro Technique](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_Technique)
10. As you build up knowledge about subject and start to understand even just a little bit of it, you gain confidence and can work even longer.
11. Taking responsibility for your actions and inaction helps you dramatically increase chances of success in your life.
12. Consciously choose to like the subject.
13. Teaching friends is unbeatable.
14. Whenever you listen, see, talk, read, write, feel, taste or practice something, fibers called dendrites grow out of the neurons. New dendrites take time to grow. Practice makes connection stronger and stronger.
15. 70% of anything new is forgotten within 24 hours if it is practiced right away. Practice is not simply reading and writing again and again. Test your knowledge. Apply it.
16. Be careful of bad habits like watching too much TV for example can cause too many of those dendrites to grow, giving your brain the wrong signal that this is very important to you.
17. We remember 95% of what we teach to someone else. 
18. Learning is just a matter of growing dendrites and strengthening connections between them. Practice what you learned within 24 hours, A few times again in a week. Don't fool in thinking that you know the material - practice, discuss and teach.
19. Draw mind maps on whiteboard or paper. [Read this to know more](https://www.adelaide.edu.au/writingcentre/sites/default/files/docs/learningguide-mindmapping.pdf)
6 C's of mind mapping
c1: Central Idea 
c2: conciseness
c3: craziness
c4: curves 
c5: colors
c6: cartoons
20. Good news needs to be flow around, downwards and upwards. If you have bad news, share it only with your superiors or with people who can do something about it.
21. When faced with a task, come up with ideas how to accomplish it. Don't waste time giving reasons about why it cannot be done. Accept that it has to happen and figure out ways of making it happen.
22. "With" - This single word can make such a huge difference in the way leader leads the team. One leader says he has a team working under him. Another says he has a team working with him.
23. Authority equation
Authority to be shown = criticality of project / Experience of the team
24. Tremendous satisfaction comes from a job well done.
25. Take full responsibility if the team fails and pass on the credit to them if they succeed. Turning problem into opportunity is the leader's job.
26. Fair compensation, instilling a sense of purpose, giving opportunities for mastery, granting autonomy and generating feeling of safety are cornerstones of secrets of creating and leading great teams.
27. It's not about what's being said, it's all about who is saying it.
28. The most authentic thing about us - human beings, is our capacity to love =, to laugh, to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform and to be greater than whatever challenges life throws at us.
29. Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.
30. Udyoginam Purushsimha upeyati Laxmi. - Laxmi (wealth and success) comes to the one who is willing to work dilligently and has the courage of a lion. Believe that you have this courage and work hard. Keep your eyes wide open, When opportunity knocks open the door.
31. Intention, Attention, Manifestation 
32. You only have control over your actions, never results of those actions. 
Karmanye vadhikaraste Ma Phaleshu Kadachana,
Ma Karmaphalaheturbhurma Te Sangostvakarmani
By Lord Krishna, [Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 2, Verse: 47]
(https://vivekavani.com/bhagavad-gita-chapter-2-verse-47/)

33. Your reason behind study/work should be strong. The "Why" should be strong enough to sustain you in long term in same work that you don't need any external motivation for it.
34. Intention, attention on action, non-attachment to results, ability to wait and a strong reason results in manifestation.
35. Don't ever spend more than you earn.
36. One of the biggest secret to secret of attracting wealth is donating a part of it to charity.
37. The ability to give is the signature of being rich.
38. Be in the company of people who respect wealth.
39. Never ever use derogatory words like filthy, stinking, obscene etc. to describe prosperity.
40. Rich people invest, others save.
41. Don't get caught up in anything that promises quick money. It simply doesn't exist.
42. Abundance begets abundance.
43. Gratitude for all that you have and forbearance to wait and work for all that you want will make you very, very rich indeed.
44. Once you have acquired the knowledge, it will always be yours.
45. Practice brings perfection. Learning and repeating something 20 times a say is useless, but repeating and revising it once a day for 10 days makes great foundation.
46.Whenever we try to learn something neural connections are made which further gives rise to new ones.
47. If you felt lecture is getting boring ask a question, you will be conscious about lecture. Active learning is far better than passive learning. Learning by doing.
48. Exercise gives rise/birth to new neurons. Hence physical workout is important.
49. Success isn't come to smart people, there are many smart people who are not successful, but there are lots of people very, very passionate and persistent of really staying the course, studying, working on it and not letting go, Not giving up.
50. There are two thinking mode - focused thinking mode and diffused thinking mode.
51. Procrastination is the root of all evil.
52. Focus, Practice, repetition
53. Chunks are literally chunks of information in our brain. Chunks can be made by practicing consciously again and again. First step to form chunk is giving full attention towards information.
54. Only doing it yourself helps create that underlie true mastery.
55. Recalling is far better than rereading
56. Rereading is illusion of competence (studying) in case are feeling doing it easier than recalling.
57. Recalling material when you are outside your usual place can also help to strengthen it.
58. Write on paper to as you have to teach it to someone else.
59. Chunking is related to habbit. the clue - The routine -  The reward - The habbit
60. Minimize distractions while studying.
61. Write weekly and daily journal planner.
62. Try to work on most disliked and most important task first.
63. Arrange your work in small challenges and make sure you get the reward.
64. Studying before sleep is very useful.
65. Associate study that should be memorized with interesting things.
66. Visual representation is great in memorization.
67. Practice problem-solving.
68. For memorization group and simplify your content in memory.
69. [Memory palace technique](https://artofmemory.com/blog/how-to-build-a-memory-palace/)
70. Metaphors are useful in memorization.
71. People learn by trying to make sense out of the information they perceive.
72. Taking responsibility for your own learning is one of the most important things you can do.
73. You must not fool yourself. You are easiest person to be fooled by you.
74. Testing is itself an extraordinary powerful learning experience.
- Test preparation checklist
- Did you make serious effort to understand the text?
- Did you work with classmates on homework problems?
- Did you attempt to outline every homework problem solution?
- Did you participate actively in homework group discussions?
- Did you understand all of your homework problem solution? (when they are handed to you)
- Did you ask in class for explanation of homework problem solution that weren't clear to you?
- If you had a study guide, did you carefully go through if before the test and convince yourself that you could do everything on it?
- Did you attempt to outline lots of problem solution quickly?
- Did you go over study guide and problems with classmates and quiz one another
- If there was a review session before the test, did you attend it and ask questions about anything you weren't sure about?
- Did you get the reasonable night's sleep before the test?
75. Practice makes permanent.
76. You have not truly learned something unless you can teach it to others.
77. Passions can broaden, change and grow.
78. Consistency and hardwork leads to concentration.
79. Human mind is a combination of monkey's jumps from here to there and elephant's power. The one who can control both monkey and elephant can control the mind.
80. Once you sit for study be stable, give atleast 1 hour to a subject at a time. Tell others to not to disturb you at the time of study.
81. To be aware at mind level - 
Avoid food which tends to sleep.
Be clean, keep clothes and room neat and clean.
have determination.
chitchatting and unnecessary talking should be completely avoided.
Eat dry fruits.
If you have faith in something pray him/her honestly.
Faith leads to confidence.
Don't doubt your own ability of learning.
One more key to concentration is love, mind always resides on what it loves. student need to develop love for study.

82. In begining student needs to put efforts to like study, afterwards when subject is clear to you , being undertood by you, your interest in studies also grow automatically.
83. Faith and love brings concentration effortlessly without any conflict.
84. If you don't understand a word, find it's meaning. This is silly thing but many a times people go on reading just for sake of reading wihtout properly understanding.
85. However genius you are, nothing is achieved without enough hardwork and try.
86. Nothing is impossible for a human with persistence and who is stick to his aim.
87. Non-attachment should be practised to achieve your aim all other attractions (or actually "distractions") should be avoided. you should not think about anything else rather than your current work.
88. Once you have develop a little interest and concentration you should increase speed and hardwork.
89. True sign of concentration is you forgot other things while studying even thirst and hunger too.
90. Deep Work: Professional activities performed in a state of distraction free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill and are hard to replicate.
Shallow Work: Non cognitive demanding, logistical-style tasks, often performed while distracted. These efforts tend to not create much value in the world and are easy to replicate
91. Two core abilities for thriving in new economy are 
first is the ability to quckly master hard things and second is the ability to produce at eleite level in terms of both quality and speed
92. Deep work helps you quickly learn hard things and deep work helps you to produce at elite level.
93. Beatiful code is short and concise, so if you were to give that code to another programmer, they would say, "oh, that's well written code. It's much like as if you were writing a poem"
94. Embrace boredom.
95. Don't take breaks from distraction, Instead take breaks from focus.