How to Increase Concentration: 5 Tips to Improving Focus

It's no surprise that a lot of us struggle with concentration. There are distractions everywhere that pull our focus and decrease our attention span. 

From doom scrolling to constant noise, it's getting increasingly hard to concentrate in our daily lives. Feeling like you can't focus can be incredibly frustrating. It can affect your ability to carry out daily tasks and can negatively affect your relationships. 

Hope isn't completely lost! Recognizing that you want to improve your ability to focus is the first step to fixing your attention span. We're here to offer some advice on how you can increase your ability to concentrate. This blog will explore: 

• What causes poor concentration
• Why it's important to stay focused
• 5 tips to improving focus

What Causes Poor Concentration? 

There can be many reasons you might feel like you're lacking a solid attention span. There are health conditions and lifestyle factors that can affect our ability to focus. 

Some health conditions that can cause poor concentration are: 

• ADHD
• Depression
• Anxiety 
• Insomnia 

While you can make some changes to your lifestyle on your own to improve focus caused by a health condition, you should still seek advice from a medical professional for the best ways to manage these diagnoses. 

There are also lifestyle factors that can affect focus. Some of these factors are: 

• Poor quality of sleep
• Hunger
• Lack of exercise
• Stress

Lifestyle factors are a bit easier to address on your own. A mix of health conditions and lifestyle factors can also be the reason you struggle to concentrate. Once you uncover the causes of your inability to focus, you can start to develop a plan to improve your attention span. 

Why is it Important to Stay Focused? 

If you do have a poor attention span, you might not feel any sense of urgency to fix it. If you're still getting by and accomplishing everything you need to, why does it really matter if you struggle to focus? 

There are a number of benefits that come with the ability to concentrate. The most obvious benefit of focus is productivity. When you can put your full attention towards work or school, you can stay on top of deadlines and accomplish more in a set period of time. It can make your life easier and help you maintain a healthy work/school-life balance. 

Productivity shouldn't be your only motivation to improve focus. There are other benefits that also stress the importance of a good attention span: 

• Helps you stay present. When you're on the phone or having an in-person conversation with someone, focus can keep you attentive and fully in the moment. 
• Improves active listening. In the same vein, the ability to concentrate makes you a better listener. Your mind won't wander to other things and you'll be able to give your full attention to whoever you're talking to. 
• Reduces stress. Believe it or not, being able to focus can actually reduce stress. When you give your full attention to what you're working on, background worries and anxieties tend to quiet down. 
• Unlocks creativity. Fully immersing yourself in a project can actually unlock your creativity. Quieting distractions creates the perfect conditions for innovation and out-of-the-box thinking. 
• Helps you think clearly. Focus can also help you think clearly. When you don't have a million thoughts racing through your mind, you can actually think clearly. This can help you make better decisions and avoid making mistakes. 

There are a multitude of other reasons that should convince you to start working on your attention span. Being focused can improve your overall quality of life and can make you a better person. 

How to Increase Concentration: 5 Tips for Improving Focus 

Now that you know what might be causing a lack of concentration and why you should care about working on your attention span, let's talk about how you can actually improve focus. 

Here are 5 tips for improving focus: 

1. Train your brain. Playing brain games, like sudoku or crossword puzzles, are a fun way to train your brain into focusing. These games require your full attention and the more you spend your time doing them, the better your ability to focus will get. 
2. Prioritize good sleep. Since poor quality of sleep can cause a lack of concentration, prioritizing good sleep is a great way to improve focus. Ideally, you should be getting 7-8 hours of quality sleep a night. Turn off the screens an hour or so before you plan to go to sleep and establish a regular routine. Going to bed around the same time every night and waking up around the same time every morning trains your body into getting regular sleep. 
3. Incorporate "brain foods" into your diet. There are "brain foods" that are great for nourishing the brain. Fatty fish, like salmon, leafy greens, berries full of antioxidants, and hearty nuts are all foods to incorporate into your diet to improve concentration. 
4. Meditate. Meditation is a great way to train your brain into focusing. It might be hard to get into at first, but once you practice a bit, you'll start to get the hang of meditating. Start by focusing on a candle or your breathing and avoid letting your mind wander. Commit to meditating in the morning or at night to really get into the focusing mindset. 
5. Invest in fidget tools. Fidgeting is a proven method to improving focus. Toys and other tools that give your brain something else to do when you're trying to focus can quiet those unproductive thoughts. Fidget jewelry is a subtle, fashionable way that you can introduce fidgeting into your daily life. To learn more about how fidgeting can improve focus, check out this blog post.

Improve Your Attention Span and Start Focusing

You now have the knowledge and tools you need to start improving your attention span. You can start working on your ability to focus upon completion of this post! 

You can check out our extensive line of fidget jewelry here if you want to start investing in fidget tools as a method of improving focus.