Quotes About Attention

In other words: Spend more time in the TPN focusing on a single task. We know what you might be thinking: The whole point is that I can't focus on a single task! But you can—you are already a master of distraction, so now distract yourself. Productivity isn't the point here. Moving the toggle switch is.

As far as I can see, many people who don't have ADD are charter members of the Society of the Congenitally Boring. And

These examples reflect the stuff adult ADD is made of. Peter's piles are particularly emblematic. So many adults with ADD have piles, little mess-piles, big mess-piles, piles everywhere. They are like a by-product of the brain's work. What other people somehow put away, people with ADD put into piles.

Lots of kids who have ADD also have something else, something we don't have a name for, something good. They can be highly imaginative and empathic, closely attuned to the moods and thoughts of the people around them, even as they are missing most of the words that are being said.

In fact, we do not suffer from a deficit of attention. Just the opposite. We've got an overabundance of attention, more attention than we can cope with; our constant challenge is to control it.

the person with ADD seldom feels bored. This is because the millisecond he senses boredom, he swings into action and finds something new; he changes the channel.

Easy distractibility, trouble focusing attention, tendency to tune out or drift away in the middle of a page or a conversation, often coupled with an ability to hyperfocus at times.

To tell a person who has ADD to try harder is about as helpful as telling someone who is nearsighted to squint harder.

Russell Barkley similarly describes the primary problem in ADD as a deficit in the motivation system, which makes it impossible to stay on task for any length of time unless there is constant feedback, constant reward.

The tension of constructing an explanation, from A to B to C to D, apparently so simple a task, irritates many people with ADD. While they can hold the information in mind, they do not have the patience to sequentially put it out. That is too tedious. They would like to dump the information in a heap on the floor all at once and have it be comprehended instantly. Otherwise

Always valuable, your attention has now also become one of your most insecure assets and most-sought-after possessions.

Eldredge has just said gives a pretty good short description of ADD: You don't mean to do the things you do do, and you don't do the things you mean to do.

For someone who has ADD, being bored is like being asphyxiated. It cannot be endured for more than a minute or so. When bored, the person with ADD feels compelled to do something immediately to bring the world back up to speed. Adrenaline

Beware the toast that has no ears

There are as many ways to do this as there are to portray characters in the theater. You can be the drunken cowboy from Texas or the wildly animated lady from Taiwan who can't wait to get her next bet down. You can be Caspar Milquetoast, the nervous accountant from Indianapolis who has already lost too much down the street. Or Miss Spectacular, who draws all the attention to herself, not to how she bets and plays.

After a glass or two, your attention is narrowed to only the immediate surroundings. You meander unpredictably, more free to follow wherever the conversation might take you. You feel happy and unconcerned about future consequences. Your motor skills are rubbish. On the other hand, if you speak a second language, you might find yourself suddenly a bit more confident and fluent. In other words, you are a child again, with all of the benefits and costs that come with stunting the PFC.

work in social psychology has made it clear that cognitive control is a limited resource. When a teacher taps on a dozing student's desk and says: "Pay attention!" it turns out that this is not a metaphor: attention is costly, and if it is "spent" on one task there is less available to spend on another. This phenomenon is known as "ego depletion". ... The moral? Effort is effort, mental or physical.

I was thinking that a life is just the history of what we give our attention to,' said Patrick. 'The rest is packaging.

I learned early on that most yoga poses are about showing off. You find something amazing you can do, and suddenly, Shazam—you're a guru, ready for your groupies.

I think Haiti is a place that suffers so much from neglect that people only want to hear about it when it's at its extreme. And that's what they end up knowing about it.

MORAL: The grass is only greener when you're not caring for your own lawn.

The Street paid no attention to the earthquake the first day or two. They'll tell you that it was because the first despatches were not so alarming, but I think it was because it took so long to change the point of view of the public toward the securities markets.

Attention in whatever sense carries the outcome.

Continuity in any affair creates curiosity and attention.