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  • Study Tips

    Study Tips
    23 Oct
    2018
    Tagged as

    Posted by Evolve College News

    How to Keep on Track!

    We’ve heard of people doing all sorts of things when they are supposed to be studying – teenagers laying bricks, fixing doors and lights – all far better distractions than screens of course, but what do we do when those books are beckoning but we just seem to keep putting it off? 

    Here are some tips that may help: 

    Purpose 
    Reconnect to your purpose in studying. If you remember why you’re doing it, it might re-spark the fact that you do actually want to do it and hand in hand with that, is the knowing that you do need to work to get it done. 

    Bring your all 
    If you remember your purpose, then you have a choice – are you going to bring your all or are you going to bring half or in other words, less? If you bring less – a half-hearted effort, then the fact is you’re not going to enjoy the study, you’ll do a less than great job and you won’t feel good about it, or yourself. Mmmmm. Is that what we really want? 

    Probably not, but it does sound familiar, doesn’t it?

    Be organised 
    Keep your study or work space clear and organised. After all, it’s not very inviting or enjoyable to sit in a cluttered area full of disregard, unattended to papers, old coffee or water cups, dusty/dirty desk, and so on. It gives us space when the environment around us is clear and organised, and it actually only takes a few minutes to keep it that way each day. In fact, what a great way to end each day – than to prepare your desk for the next day, so it is actually a joy to come back to. 

    Prepare 
    The same goes for your study. Prepare for what you are going to be doing and have all your tools/resources ready. Set yourself up with water and a comfy chair/desk and make it a lovely space to come to. 

    Get into it
    Focus. When it’s time to work, it’s time to work. So don’t float off into other things in your mind or get pulled into distractions by your phone etc. Social media can wait…. Now it’s study time. Give it a go in 90 minute or 2 hour blocks and really focus. 

    Break
    Take short breaks in between each block. Move your body physically and enjoy the feeling of your body moving. Feel your feet as you walk, feel your legs, feel your arms. Do they feel heavy today? Or light? Free, or restricted? Notice what’s going on with your body as you walk it or do whatever it is you choose to do. You only need a 5 or ten minute break to recharge, then get back into it. 

    Repeat 
    You can repeat the above two steps. 

    Lunch 
    Take time for lunch. Give yourself time to rest if you need to – even a 15 minute nap (in your car, on a couch or wherever is practical for you) can make a huge difference and help stop that ‘lag’ we often feel in the afternoon. 

    Then get back into it
    In the afternoon we often get a bit tired. This is when we can start to lose focus and look for more distractions, things to eat or drink and pep us up, etc etc. But if we just focus and get on with it, we may find it’s not nearly as hard as we think to study and just get it done.

    Give yourself space 
    Don’t cram things in at the last minute. It puts enormous stress on you and is counter-productive. The job you do in a crunch is never as good as if you were really prepared, organised and felt you had space. Make your study enjoyable. 

    Enjoy it! 
    After all, learning should be enjoyable – we all naturally love learning. It’s the way we do it and in many cases the way we have been taught to do it that we don’t like. It turns us off, feeling pressured, feeling like it’s too much, etc etc. But if we really look at it, what turns us right off is that a lot of what we study we don’t see a purpose for, especially in schooling years. We look at life and what we have already gleaned as being needed for life and we can see we are not being taught it at school. The same goes for higher education, whether vocational or higher education. We want learning to be real, we want it to have a purpose that we can connect to. 

    When we connect with the purpose behind our learning then even if there are drab bits we have to get through, we can see why we just need to do them, as they are simply part of the overall package we need to complete. 

    Value it all 
    Life and work always have some parts we might call boring. We need to bring as much commitment and focus to those bits as we do to the bits we love. Make it even – and if you choose to bring just as much to the ‘boring bits’ – you may find that even they can actually be very enjoyable. On top of that, you know they are needed for the whole. 

    Look after yourself
    The way you eat and what you eat, what you choose to do at night before sleep, how late you stay up and how ‘wired’ you let yourself be, all have an impact on how you sleep. And yes, sleep matters. After all, don’t you feel and do better the next day when you’ve had a solid, deep rest? It’s worth taking care of yourself in the lead up to bed, rather than burning the candle at both ends, which is never really worth it in the end. There is actually a purpose in sleeping deeply as it rejuvenates us for the next day, so you can feel fantastic. 

    Wouldn’t you love to feel fantastic, consistently so? Listening to our body and not pushing it or over-riding it is a very simple recipe to follow to feel great. That plus having purpose does a massive amount for how we feel within ourselves. 

    Apply this to work
    The above doesn’t just apply to study. It also applies to work, home duties and the way we approach our days – whatever it is we choose to do. 

    Enjoy, and hey – let’s get back to work! 

    NOTES ON REFERENCING AND LINKING 
    You are welcome to link to or refer to our articles from Evolve College News. Acknowledgement of Evolve College News is required, along with a link to the original article and our site. Questions are to be directed to news@evolvecollege.com.