One Superpower to Enhance Them All
This supreme superpower makes all the others stronger
40 Seconds
The average person working at a computer can do this for 40 seconds, with the range being ~ 25-75 seconds.
No - I’m not talking about surviving the no-Internet dinosaur game.
I’m talking about the ability to focus, also known as Concentration.
In an in-the-wild (i.e., not in a laboratory) study, Microsoft researchers found that participants switched between tasks every 40 seconds. 😟 And when messaging apps were open, that switch happened every 35 seconds.1
Concentration - Or Something Else?
It’s a common belief that playing a computer game for three hours straight or watching an entire show’s season in a single evening is a display of Concentration. But this actually isn’t Concentration - it’s Distraction.
What’s the difference?
Being distracted is a passive (yet still reactive) situation, letting yourself be influenced by something over which you have no control. You don’t control which bad guy comes at you next, or what happens in the show’s following scene. Those sensorial things are simply presented to you, and then you react. To call distraction a “passive activity” would be very ironic.
Concentration, on the other hand, is an extremely active undertaking. Particularly in our highly-digital, highly-distracting world, Concentration takes very deliberate work. We have to fight to concentrate. To concentrate today is extremely tough, with temptations lurking around every corner:
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The Supreme Superpower
Why is Concentration the Supreme Superpower? If you’re anything like me, I can’t finish most important things in 75 seconds.
(Fun fact: I taught my daughter to solve the Rubik’s Cube, and her best time is 45 seconds - and this isn’t a speed cube! 😊 Not that that’s important . . . but it’s a cool thing to be able to say, I think. Yes, I’m sorry; I know I just distracted you.)
And what’s even worse: several studies have shown that, once we are distracted in the middle of a task, it takes us a jaw-dropping 25 minutes to regain our focus, to get back to where we were working before the distraction.
Let’s look at that math a different way: 25-75 seconds of concentrated work is often followed by a distracted period of 1,500 seconds.
Our distracted time is 20-60 times greater than our time spent concentrating.
That’s an absolutely massive productivity leak in our day.
Reclaim Your Time
What if you could reclaim hours of your week, or even of every day?
This is totally possible with two simple (but not necessarily easy) strategies. While either is powerful, both together are unbeatable:
lengthen the time that you can concentrate
shorten the time that it takes you to refocus
To lengthen the time that you can concentrate, shut out as many distractions as possible, both externally (your phone, notifications, social media) and internally (your own worries, interests, to-do lists).
And the mere knowing of how long it takes the average person to refocus helps you refocus more quickly. How neat is that!
A Character Boost, Too
Not only does strengthening your Concentration positively affect your work, it also favorably impacts your character.
Maria Montessori (1870-1952) noted that, in her schools, the children’s behavior improved immensely after they developed their ability to concentrate. She called this character improvement, as a result of Concentration:
the most important single result of our whole work.2
Take some time to reflect on your ability to concentrate. Find your sources of distraction, and just start by eliminating one. You are very capable of strengthening your Superpower of Concentration, second by second.
Work done more quickly = more time to play!
1 Bailey, Chris. Hyperfocus, 2018, p. 73.
2 The Absorbent Mind, trans. Claremont, 1967, p. 204.