Is negative thinking a habit you could learn to break?

Seeing the negative is our brain's default mode, born of a primal need to identify dangers in life and protect ourselves from them; rooted in the brain's limbic system and close to our emotional processing centre. Powerful stuff.

All well and good when you have to be wary of marauding sabre-toothed tigers, but less useful when you are trying to get a piece of work done at your desk, manifesting itself in the form of negative thinking.

You know the scenario: you start doing something that's a little outside your comfort zone, it's making you a tad anxious, and then that self-sabotaging thought pops into your head: it's too difficult; I can't do it. Or worse: I'm useless; it's all hopeless. And you want to give up. Go home. Retreat under the duvet.

Suddenly you're into a spiral of negative thought processes every bit as distracting as the tinny baseline coming from a teenager's iPod headphones.

That internal critic can sabotage your efforts better than anyone else you know - if you let it.

The good news is that because negative thinking can become a habit, just like biting your nails, it's a habit you can - and should - break.

Identifying cycles of negative thought is a first step - do you recognise any of these?

- Equating how you feel with your sense of self: I feel stupid so I must be stupid. It's just not true. You may have made a mistake (see below) but it doesn't make you stupid.

- Making mistakes: a mistake is just something you do that gets you a result you don't want. No more than that. But there's no need to make the same mistake more than once. It's an opportunity to learn.

- All or nothing thinking: one small mistake, and you're a complete failure? No, you just made a mistake (see above).

- Awful-ising: always anticipating an awful outcome means that you are constantly preparing for the worst. How many times does the worst happen? Not that often. Save your emotional energy for when it does, but don't waste time anticipating something that might never happen.

- Personalisation: assuming that anything that goes wrong is your responsbility. It's not your fault! Sometimes, stuff just happens.

Negative thinking is an all too easy habit to get into. Recognise it, park it, and get on with whatever it is you want to do...

Walking workouts for body and brain

I have just re-instigated my walking plan - wearing MBT trainers to make it even more effective - now the weather is nice, there's no excuse. I'm aiming to do it daily to see how far it improves my concentration, mood and bottom!

It takes me exactly 30 minutes to do the circuit I've devised around my home, which also takes in a series of slight inclines, and walking at a speed that makes me slightly out of breath. Sometimes I walk first thing in the morning, sometimes at lunchtime, sometimes in the evening - fitting it in to my schedule couldn't be easier.

What's more, wearing my MBT trainers - Masai Barefoot Technology - ups my exercise quota. I first wrote about these trainers in the Sunday Times' Style magazine in 2003 and have been an advocate ever since.

Independent research studies show that when you walk in these for 30 minutes, it's the equivalent of 90 minutes exercise because the instability provided by the patented sole technology is proven to increase muscle activity - one study showed activity in the thigh and buttock muscles increased by an average 37%!

And during that 30 minutes I find my mind settling and focusing. Tension reduces, my shoulders unhunch, my breathing deepens, ideas are formed, plans are made. It's a great way to, literally, think things through.

I once joined a gym. I can't remember ever going. Not a good way to exercise, then.

So like Demi Moore in her new film The Joneses I'm going to wear my MBTs, and take a walk.

http://uk.mbt.com/

Could selective ignorance be a route to better concentration?

Selective ignorance – or, the low-information diet – is a term coined by Timothy Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Work Week – and could be a helpful strategy in improving concentration levels.

It’s a simple concept: reduce the amount of time you spend grazing on information – online, TV, radio, newspapers, Tweets, you name it you've probably done it – because you won’t benefit from it, and it may even be completely counter-productive to what you are trying to achieve.

“Most information is time-consuming, negative, irrelevant to your goals, and outside of your influence,” says Ferriss. “I challenge you to look at whatever you read or watched today and tell me that is wasn’t at least two of the four.”

Culturally, we have become information junkies. It’s akin to that adolescent fear of not being “in the know” whatever the “know” might be. We find it hard to say, “Oh, I didn’t know that” for fear of being seen as outside the loop, so we try and input everything and anything that may put us ahead of the game.

But the aim, says Ferriss, is to focus on output, not input, and it is this that leads to success. He talks about attention management being as important as time management, and says, “The only option is selective ignorance – one of the few common traits among top performers.”

Certainly something worth considering - but please read this blog first!

Ballet lessons in concentration

Yesterday I went to watch members of the Royal Ballet take a class with legendary Cuban teacher Loipa Arauja and, in particular, to see a spectacular young Colombian dancer, Fernando Rodriguez Montano - appearing in the dynamic cameo role as the Jester in the current production of Cinderella at the Royal Opera House.

Around 20 of the world's top dancers - and both Carlos Acosta and Tamara Rojo were also taking a class there, showing that however great you are you still have to practice - spent an hour and a half working their bodies under instruction.

Total. Focus. Concentration. Control.

Yes, the dancers are used to the steps but not necessarily the sequencing relentlessly demanded by their teacher, so they really focus. I saw them watching her closely, their eyes following every tiny movement, counting the beats, making minimal gestures with their hands as they mentally rehearsed what their bodies would in a moment be required to do with precision and grace and energy.

And Loipa Araujo was focused too, not missing a beat, gently elevating a rib cage here, relaxing a shoulder there, realigning an arm, and repeating and repeating until the movement becomes second nature. With bodies like these you can't take risks, and the dancers know that their craft lies in the sort of dedication that has them practicing day after day after day.

Speaking to Fernando later - at just 25, he has been with the Royal Ballet for five years and his personal saga is a story in itself - he confirms that concentration is key.

"For those 90 minutes I focus 100%, and I am constantly monitoring my body, perfecting or extending some subtlety of movement, following my teacher's instructions."

Watching the class in action - a beautiful privilege in itself - was also like watching a masterclass in concentration. It is what keeps those dancers at the top of their game and, literally, on their toes.

www.roh.org.uk

Do meetings make you lose concentration?

Or even the will to live?

I can't remember many work meetings which weren't a waste of time... or when I didn't lose concentration. Not a unique experience, I discover, thanks to Phil Daoust's Guardian article which sums it all up pretty well, and shows that meetings are not the intellectually stimulating, creative event they are cracked up to be...

"No successful decision has ever been made in a meeting," said one contributor.

"Ninety percent of the time, in today's corporate world, calling a meeting is an abuse of power," said another.

So how can you make sure they work better? Check out the link below.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2010/apr/23/meetings-how-to-make-them-good

Do you know your BDNF from your elbow?

We all know that exercise is good for our physical health, but research has shown that physical exercise is also good for brains. Yes, getting physical raises the level of feel-good hormones called endorphins but it also raises levels of BDNF – brain-derived neurotropic factor to the uninitiated.

“I cannot over-estimate how important regular exercise is in improving the function of the brain,” says John Ratey, clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard. “Exercise stimulates our grey matter to produce Miracle-Gro for the brain.”

This Miracle-Gro is BDNF. When we take physical exercise, our working muscles send chemicals into the bloodstream, including a protein known as IGF-1. Once in the brain, this stimulates the production of BDNF which helps new brain cells, and their connections, to grow.

In addition, levels of other neurotransmitters are increased after the sort of exercise session that will raise your pulse and cause a bit of a sweat (tiddlywinks players don’t qualify) for at least 20 minutes.

“Dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine – all of these are elevated after exercise,” says Ratey. “So having a workout will help improve focus, help keep you calm and reduce impulsivity." He goes as far as to describe the effect of exercise as being like a natural dose of Prozac or Ritalin – but with out the deleterious side effects.

Ratey's gold standard, which needs to be built up to gradually, is: one hour of moderate exercise (power walking or jogging) four days a week; a shorter (45 minute burst) of intense activity (squash or running) twice a week, combined with strength training and balance drills.

What's more, the positive effect of exercise continues long after your daily session. So whatever your age, if this isn’t a good enough reason to get exercising – what is??!

Spark! The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, by John Ratey, Quercus publishing, 2008

Can you train your brain to concentrate?

So… brain training won’t help improve brain function in terms of general reasoning, memory, planning or visuospatial abilities, according to a new study which followed 11,430 people over six weeks – but would brain training help your concentration?

Certainly, with practice, participants in the study got better at what they were doing – proving something that every neuroscientist, top musician or sportsperson knows – if you practice, you will improve.

The same goes for concentration. Practice concentrating, using brain training games if you like: but if you want to improve your concentration, practicing really helps.

Concentration is the X factor that makes improvement of other skills possible - so train your brain to concentrate!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8630588.stm