What's going on guys? in this video I'm going to talk to you about overcoming procrastination;
how to study when you feel like you just cannot do it.
I’m going to break this down into three easy principles.
The first is the location and environment where you’re studying.
In another video I’ll go into more detail as to what makes for a good study environment.
But for the sake of this video, let’s assume that you’re in a place where you’re not
getting distracted, where you’re able to focus, and get work done.
Number two, is Just Start.
The hardest part, and the reason why we all procrastinate is that it’s so difficult
to start.
Getting yourself to start makes the whole process that much easier – it’s all downhill
from there.
So what I would tell myself is, I’m just going to work for 5 minutes.
By making it seem much less daunting by saying "okay, just five minutes" it was not much
easier for me to start and then once those five minutes were up and I asked myself "hey,
do I need to take a break?
Or can I keep working?" more often than not, a lot easier to just keep working at that
point.
Another thing that’s going to help is breaking your work into sizeable chunks.
What do I mean by that?
If you have a lot of work to do, don’t tell yourself that you need to get all that work
done in one go.
For example, if you have this entire textbook that you need to read, tell yourself that
you need to read that whole textbook in one night, obviously is going to be a daunting
task and you’re not going to want to ever get to it.
But if instead you tell yourself, I'm ust gonna read one section or one chapter, it
becomes a lot more manageable.
By doing this, and by organizing your work in your to-do list in this way, when you start
geting things done, this small tasks and you start checking them off, you build momentum
and that's gonna carry you forward.
Number three is take breaks.
Now, there’s a little bit of a science and a technique in how to take breaks.
First of all is the frequency; how often should you be taking breaks?
I recommend every 30-60 minutes.
Anything shorter than that – you’re not getting much work done, and anything longer
than that, your attention span is deteriorating and you’re having diminishing returns with
your study time.
The next is duration; how long should your breaks be?
That obviously depends on how long you’re studying for.
So, if you’re only been studying for 30 minutes, take a short 5 minute break.
If you’re studying for 60 minutes, take a longer 10 minute break.
Taking breaks much longer than this defeats the purpose of taking the break and trying
to study in the first place.
And third, know when to stop.
There are going to be times when you’re going to be sitting down, and even though
you’re taking these breaks, you’re just so burned out and you can’t focus and you
can’t get anything done – it’s times like this when it’s better to get up, go
to the gym, do something productive.
Go eat, get away from your desk, get away from your work space, clear your mind.
When you return it’ll be that much easier to get back into it.
The next thing I wanna talk about is The Pomodoro Technique.
This is a technique that worked very well for me and what it is - so, what you do is
you work for 25 minutes, and then take a 5 minute break, and to do that 4 times.
So in total, you’re working for a total of 2 hours and after this 2 cycles, yo take
a 20 minutes break.
So, all in all a Pomodoro cycle takes 2 hours and 20 minutes.
After that, you repeat, and you can do this as many times as you would like.
The app that I used to time myself is called 30/30 for iOS, but there’s many free alternatives
out there.
I like this app because it gives you some flexibility and it has a very clean interface.
The reason I’m such a big proponent of the Pomodoro technique is when you first start
studying, when your mind is fresh, you’re going to feel like you can get so much work
done.
That you can study for 60 minutes and still focus, take a 5 minutes break.
But I found that when I did that, I would get burned out much quicker.
By the time the afternoon or the evening came, I wouldn’t be able to work anymore.
And let's say I had an exam the next day, that would be very bad.
So instead, by doing the Pomodoro technique and by taking that break after 25 minutes
even when I felt like I could keep going, that helped keep me fresh throughout the day.
And I was able to study and maintain my productivity and my retention for longer periods of time.
So that's it, those are the three concepts.
If you guys have any questions or comments, leave them below and I'll see you guys in
the next video.