By Susan Smith Nash, Ph.D.
It never fails, the most disruptive thoughts, news, events, and crises seem to occur just as you're preparing to study for your final exam, or finish a big term paper. How do you deal with distractions? Here are pointers and suggestions to help your focus, to feel good about yourself, and to believe in your ability to succeed.
1. Listen to your thoughts. Find out when and how you respond to external news or triggers. If your thoughts tend to be about people, places, social comparisons, recognize that. Try to replace the thoughts with those that relate to your task: process, procedures, short-term goals.
2. If you find yourself feeling helpless and telling yourself that you are not able to do anything to protect yourself against change, reassure yourself that your feelings and thoughts are normal. However, there are ways to protect yourself. One is to study, and keep steady with your plans to improve your life and your future. Remind yourself that statistically speaking, education is the best approach.
3. If you find your thoughts and feelings racing ahead, and you find yourself predicting negative outcomes and doomsday scenarios, recognize that you may be feeling anxious. Racing thoughts and random, negative associations that respond to feelings of being threatened are very understandable given the situation. Reassure yourself that the racing thoughts are simply racing thoughts. You do not have to act or react to them.
4. Recognize that cognitive interference tends to occur in one or more spheres of cognition. There may be a visual trigger, which will trigger thoughts and emotions. One way to respond to the visual triggers is to switch learning strategies and move more toward alternative modes. For example, you may focus on audio and kinaesthetic, which can help you keep track. Write notes. Listen to lectures. Watch videos.
5. Do what you can to place yourself in a situation that minimizes interference. When the cognitive interference occurs, sort out the task-related thoughts and the non-task related thoughts. Set aside the non-task-related thoughts, and tell yourself you do not have to react to them.
6. Realize that some decisions are fear-based and some are not. Evaluate your actions or the thoughts about the actions you're thinking about taking. Are your thoughts racing? Are you telling yourself you need to change your major? Make a list of pros and cons. Sleep on the decision.
7. Recognize when decisions need to be made quickly, and when they can be postponed. If you are studying for a test, you need to continue to study, even if your emotions are surging and you're feeling a fight-flight response. Channel the fight-flight into the fight at hand: the test. Use adrenaline to sharpen your focus on the task at hand rather than to let it distract you.
8. If your intrusive thoughts share characteristics of perfectionism, make sure that you recognize this, and the destructive nature of perfectionism. Develop a strategy for rewarding yourself for achieving small goals and milestones, and commend yourself for completing tasks, and avoid comparing your performance to others, or to a quality standard. Simply pat yourself on the back for showing up and doing it.
9. If you find you are engaging in behaviors that are ritualized and to the point of being incapacitating, it might be helpful to employ some of the strategies used by those with obsessive-compulsive disorder in order to liberate yourself from the tyranny of a compulsion, and to reintroduce choice into your life.
Self-regulation may not sound very glamorous, but if you have a good sense of how and where your mind tends to go as you study, you'll definitely benefit. Learning how to work with intrusive thoughts can be helpful for your online studies, and later in your workplace and at home.
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References
Flett, Gordon L.; Madorsky, Dara; Hewitt, Paul L.; Heisel, Marnin J. (2002). Perfectionism Cognitions, Rumination, and Psychological Distress Journal of Rational-Emotive & Cognitive-Behavior Therapy, Spring 2002, Vol. 20 Issue: Number 1 pp. 33-47.
Ladouceur, Robert; Freeston, Mark H.; Rhéaume, Josée; Dugas, Michel J.; Gagnon, Fabien; Thibodeau, Nicole; Fournier, Sarah (2000) Strategies used with intrusive thoughts: A comparison of OCD patients with anxious and community controls. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, Vol 109(2), May 2000. pp. 179-187.
Merlo, Lisa J.; Storch, Eric A. (2006) Obsessive-compulsive disorder: Tools for recognizing its many expressions. Journal of Family Practice, Mar2006, Vol. 55 Issue 3, pp. 217-222.
Pierce, Gregory R.; Ptacek, J. T.; Taylor, Bruce; Yee, Penny L.; Henderson, Ciarda A.; Lauventi, Helene J.; Loffredo, Cynthia M. (1998) The role of dispositional and situational factors in cognitive interference. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 75(4), Oct 1998. pp. 1016-1031.
Sarason, I. G., Sarason, B. R., Keefe, D. E., Hayes, B. E., & Shearin, E. N. (1986). Cognitive interference: Situational determinants and traitlike characteristics. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 51, 215-226.
Thill, Edgar E.; Cury, François. (2000). Learning to play golf under different goal conditions: their effects on irrelevant thoughts and on subsequent control strategies. European Journal of Social Psychology, Jan 2000, Vol. 30 Issue 1, pp. 101-122.