Concentration and Focus

[juturna]

I just started school and while I was doing my homework I realized what a nuisance my Ti + Si can be sometimes.

I will be in the middle of an assignment then a random sentence or phrase will spark some sort of memory then I'll fly on an unproductive trip to dream land. When I come back from dream land, I'll look down at my watch and say "F***, I just wasted another 10 minutes" then scold myself for wasting so much time.

Actually, I must have wasted another 10 minutes with my Ti thinking about what a bugger my Ti was. I think I can actually do work quicker when I'm talking to someone else. Can anyone relate? and how do you deal with this...I guess it really isn't too big of a deal. Just kind of a bugger.

 

[nemo]

I can relate to that. It happens not just for schoolwork with me though. For example, when I'm tidying the house or something, I'll find something that triggers memories and then I end up taking a trip down Memory Lane... I work better when others are working with me because I get too distracted by myself. I always start thinking about random things. >.>
How I deal with it... I don't, really, which is a really bad thing. Procrastination sucks sometimes.

 

[Latro]

Those tangents, being a break from the monotony aspect of studying (in addition to, clearly, being fairly easy to remember, at least their occurrence), are integral to learning, imo. I'm no expert, though.

 

[Berkeley]

Well you do it when studying, which is bad; but I do it when I am talking to people, which is worse. Someone will be in the middle of telling me a story and something that they say will spark something in me and I will completely zone out the rest of the story. My mind will just turn of the person and go wherever it has to go at that moment. So when the finish talking I usually remember I am supposed to be listening and then I have a sort of awkward guess I have to make. I laugh if they are smiling or laughing, or I say that sucks if it was a bad story. Whatever it is, I'm not the best at holding a conversation if I am not interested in the topic.

 

[Pershire]

I do the exact same thing, if I do not have some noise going on around me, I will start thinking about everything except what I was supposed to be doing, though it only happens when there is no one else around

 

[Kuu]

10 minutes? more like 4 hours....

 

[RubberDucky451]

I'll be listening to music while studying, then I'll think to myself "I can play that song" I then run to my piano and spend 15 minutes learning the song. I then play the song a few times and start thinking up variations of the song, different chord organizations and new melodies. I just hate tedious studying...

 

[juturna]

I'll be listening to music while studying, then I'll think to myself "I can play that song" I then run to my piano and spend 15 minutes learning the song. I then play the song a few times

I DO THE EXACT SAME THING. One of the things I've tried to help me stop wandering off is try to flush my ears with music buuut when I'm studying right next to my keyboard and I'm feeling musical...I'll pretty much play away until it's dark.

 

[Android]

I can force strong concentration, though it's unnatural for me. Schoolwork was always a last minute thing for me, and I would force myself to concentrate. I would have the normal instinct/desire to deviate into dreamland, but because of the looming deadline I would force myself back to the task at hand. I actually think my rampant inclination towards procastination helps me. If I work on a project over a period of time, the quality tends to be lacking. On the other hand, if I'm forced to crank something out all at once the quality tends to be better. During college, I took a lot of Adderall, Methylphenidate, and a bit of Methamphetamine strictly so that I could concentrate and get my homework done. I've never really taken speed recreationally.. I've just used it as a tool to increase my focus. I'm not saying people should use speed.. I've withdrawled so often in my life that the speed kicks weren't hard for me handle so I've avoided addiction. They are very easy substances to get addicted to.

 

[Jaico]

Concentration has always been fairly elusive to me when it comes to schoolwork - I always get sidetracked by some random tangent that I think of, and then thinking or researching about said topic (generally unrelated to the work) takes up the time I had planned for doing work. Oddly enough though, I can concentrate when I listen to music; if music's playing, and something else is happening, I pretty much zone out everything else and focus on listening to the music only (I can't even fathom going to sleep with music on - I've tried, and I can't stop focusing on the music)...

 

[RubberDucky451]

I DO THE EXACT SAME THING. One of the things I've tried to help me stop wandering off is try to flush my ears with music buuut when I'm studying right next to my keyboard and I'm feeling musical...I'll pretty much play away until it's dark.

:] glad to hear I'm not alone. Whenever I'm in my room with my headphones on and my mom walks up, i get unreasonably angry. Music makes me a bit emotional and temperamental.

 

[Wisp]

I'd like to be a party pooper, but that's not Ti/Si That's Pure an adulterated Ne. The ability to make random connections is N. THe ability to meld them in to a cohesive structure is Ti. Si is entirely different. It's a sort of nostalgia, a sense of the essence of how things were. That's the best way I can describe it.

 

[juturna]

Ah okay thanks for clearing that up then...I'm no pro on MBTI functions

 

[Seducer of the Homeless]

i cannot concentrate on anything, not even music. i will play an album on my i pod, then next thing i know, it's track 3 and have to start again. i rarely read books because of lack of focus. i have to be doing something else while watching a movie. i suck. for me it is not triggering memories, it is just thought. i spend all my time considering ideas, concepts (but NOT systems). introspection, psychological theorisation, philosophical and existential thought...the usual stuff. or i will see something and will follow sequentially from it, almost like a journey through the room. i hold the belief that everything in the world is merely a catalyst for either something else tangible or an idea. and i am a self-pitying bastard so i think a lot about self-hate too..but there you go.
i suppose after all of this Schoolwork just seems so banal, simple and meaningless. i think over the years i have hardly concentrated on anything, and i can't concentrate at all now, especially anywhere that requires some kind of organisation or neat system. maths, science - i massively underachieve, i say i find them hard - what i find hard is actually focusing my mind on them. also, at the start of high school i was put in classes below my ability level - all teachers said i should be in the top class, but i stayed in second class and basically grew lazy and hostile. i was surrounded by idiots. you see all the 'smart' kids being worshipped, while you rot in easy classes, how else should you react but to abandon all faith in school, people and mainly yourself - i hate myself, i am stupid, i am the only person in the school that actually sees how indoctrinative and condescending (and utterly futile) it is - i should be smarter, instead i am just lonely...screaming a lonely and solitary dissent inaudible to the world, what is the point?

ISN'T IT POSSIBLE THAT WE CAN'T CONCENTRATE AND ORGANISE IN THE SAMEWAY A RETARD CAN'T DO ALGEBRA - and is it just as unreasonable to ask us too?!

 

[Firehazard159]

Seducer, I totally relate to that :\ (And a lot of what else has been said.)

I actually did take the AP classes, they were a breeze for me.

I ended up being kicked out of most of them my senior year, because they increased the homework load. ......But not the difficulty.

Which, in the end, I didn't do homework. My grade dropped from A's and B's to D's. They put me in the regular versions of each class, my teachers were like "You're brilliant, you really shouldn't be here... you frustrate me, because it's like you just don't care." In a way, that was true, I didn't care about homework. I did care about showing the fact that I was intelligent, and I succeeded in that, somewhat. Teachers noticed, at least. I was so bored and frustrated, but the challenging classes weren't any more challenging, just more redundant with increased homework loads.

I also don't really 'system build' or whatever you want to call it, I theorize. In my current job though, as a dairy/frozen stocker, I tend to be almost excessively organized, everything has it's place. I completely reworked the way my superior had the organizational system and made it far more efficient. We now almost always get done with spare time. I also have the most fun there when I'm reorganizing shelf spaces and placing product in artsy ways, and make sure they fit visually / spatially and all that jazz. I think more J comes out in me at work, hence my neary 50/50 split on it.

Do other INTP's act like this? Sorry if I'm kind of hijacking the thread...
7-
I definitely have some major focusing issues though, like everyone else already said.

 

[Seducer of the Homeless]

Seducer, I totally relate to that :\ (And a lot of what else has been said.)

I actually did take the AP classes, they were a breeze for me.

I ended up being kicked out of most of them my senior year, because they increased the homework load. ......But not the difficulty.

Which, in the end, I didn't do homework. My grade dropped from A's and B's to D's. They put me in the regular versions of each class, my teachers were like "You're brilliant, you really shouldn't be here... you frustrate me, because it's like you just don't care." In a way, that was true, I didn't care about homework. I did care about showing the fact that I was intelligent, and I succeeded in that, somewhat. Teachers noticed, at least. I was so bored and frustrated, but the challenging classes weren't any more challenging, just more redundant with increased homework loads.

I also don't really 'system build' or whatever you want to call it, I theorize. In my current job though, as a dairy/frozen stocker, I tend to be almost excessively organized, everything has it's place. I completely reworked the way my superior had the organizational system and made it far more efficient. We now almost always get done with spare time. I also have the most fun there when I'm reorganizing shelf spaces and placing product in artsy ways, and make sure they fit visually / spatially and all that jazz. I think more J comes out in me at work, hence my neary 50/50 split on it.

Do other INTP's act like this? Sorry if I'm kind of hijacking the thread...
7-
I definitely have some major focusing issues though, like everyone else already said.

don't think so, but i would do this. spend all day on one shelf just so i could get away with only doing one or two shelves a day

 

[Vecna]

I've never had issues with concentration as an INTJ. Would it help if you studied with another NT? Maybe if you bounced ideas off each other when doing the same homework then it will become exciting enough to concentrate on.

 

[juturna]

Would it help if you studied with another NT? Maybe if you bounced ideas off each other when doing the same homework then it will become exciting enough to concentrate on.

This actually helps a lot. I've always been able to get work done MUCH faster and more efficiently when I'm with someone else. It's not really practical though to always have to rely on another person to be there just to be able to focus on something.

On the other hand, I sometimes find that I have to become the teacher and waste a BUNCH of time trying to explain whats going on.