Lesson Overview

This lesson introduces the mental skill of concentration, defined as the ability to consistently repeat the right words and mental pictures related to a task. Concentration is not about never losing focus; it is about recognizing when the mind drifts and intentionally bringing attention back to the task at hand. The lesson emphasizes that mental skills, like physical skills, can be strengthened through consistent practice. Key topics include wandering thoughts, self-talk, attention management, sleep, and techniques for improving focus and achieving optimal performance. 

Lesson Objectives

By the end of this lesson, learners will be able to:

1. Define concentration as the ability to repeat effective words and mental images that support performance. 
2. Recognize wandering chatter as a normal human tendency and understand the importance of redirecting attention back to the task. 
3. Explain how self-talk influences concentration and performance by replacing negative thoughts with positive, task-focused thoughts. 
4. Identify the guiding principles of concentration, including wandering chatter, sensory perception, personal words, sleep, past experiences, the law of concentration, skill-building techniques, and optimal performance. 
5. Apply the practice of returning attention to the task as a method of strengthening concentration, similar to strengthening a muscle through repetition. 
6. Understand that concentration is a trainable skill, even for individuals who experience attention-related challenges. 
7. Recognize the role of concentration in achieving optimal performance states in sports, work, and everyday activities. 

All right, we’re moving on to the second skill, the second mental skill referred to as the mental skill of concentration. Now, I don’t know where you’re at on the whole concentration thing. Again, we’re going to talk a lot about attention disorders. We’re going to talk about what optimal states mean and your ability to concentrate, the brain’s ability to focus on decision making. I have a lot going on here when it comes to the mental skill of concentration? The good news is we’ve got several guiding principles to help you along the way plus a couple of exercises.

One to strengthen the mental skill of concentration and you’ll notice one of the guiding principles is can you sleep at night? I’m gonna give you some sleep techniques. So let’s dive into some of those guiding principles right out the gate. First the definition, right? The mental skill of concentration, definition is the ability to repeat the right words and the right mental pictures. Remember, everything we do is on demand. So, did you catch it here? Once you know the right ones, the skill of communication, the right words, the idea now is to repeat it. But one of the things you’re going to learn, you already know this, the mind’s going to drift.

You’re going to be focused on A, whatever A is, A is your task. And before you realize it, you’re over here on B, C, and D. That’s a human factor. Okay? Doesn’t mean you’re broke. Nothing’s wrong with you. That’s a human factor. We all do it. Elite athletes recognize the drift. And when the drift occurs, there’s self awareness to those words and those pictures. And then there’s regulation to bring it back. So now we’re getting into the emotional intelligence skills here a little bit on the self regulation competency. But remember, we’re going to stay focused on our five mental skills right now.

But we’re always building both. We’re building mental skills and emotional skills. Key concept. All right. So let’s look at the guiding principles real quick. Number one is wandering chatter. Again, that’s the drift. You’ve got to understand that your mind is going to wander. It’s the skill of concentration that brings you back. Number two, sensory perception or common senses. You’ve got to learn how to turn that down. Get focused back on own chatter. You got to talk about that and your common senses. Number three, your words. Remembering your words are louder than any other words, but you have to have your words.

Now you can get a coach to build up a program. We’ll talk more about that, those word clusters, but your words are another guiding principle. Number four, can you sleep at night? Going to give you a couple of sleep techniques. I know you appreciate that. That helps you build the skill of concentration five windows that’s of course in and of itself the windows of self three different windows. For our conversation today, guiding principle, we’re going to focus on your past. And you already know how that works. You got a lot of bad chatter that pops up from your past.

You have a bad performance, you do less than your best. You’ve got to understand more about the windows of the past. Number six, the law of concentration. Yes, it’s a mental skill, the mental skill of concentration. It’s also a law. Number seven, enhance the skill. I’m going to give you some skill techniques, skill building exercises to develop a skill of concentration. And number eight, optimal performance. You’ve got to understand in order for you to get to the zone, optimal state, concentration is a big step. It’s a big skill. It’s a big part of you accomplishing that consistently over time.

Okay, so we’re talking about the mental skill of concentration. Now remember mental, so everything to do with mental has to do with your words and your mental pictures. And the basic idea, you already did it, is once you understand what you should be thinking about in that moment, whatever words and pictures enhance you to that optimal state, the idea is just repeat them. And when you recognize you’ve drifted, human factor, you bring them back. Now, what I want you to recognize here is that is self talk. You are now cognitively and intentionally talking to yourself. Self talk is one of the brain training techniques we learn about in the Navy SEALs. Now, that’s a separate class. You want to make sure you pick up on that class, the big four, and self talk. So, what you’re doing is you’re talking to yourself about that task. And we’ve got another stats here we understand that if you’re talking to yourself about that task, you’re able to get to optimal states. Now, again, reference our highest performance here. We go to our military, we look at our SWAT, law enforcement, you know, they’re working at optimal states as well.

It’s not so much a win or a lose. For them. The stakes are a lot higher, but we’re still studying the brain in the same way, and we’re able to make sense out of it, more importantly, able to train now, able to train the brain. With demand for special forces increasing, the Navy continues to develop brain training techniques to see if they can improve the pass rate. But there are some fears that scientists believe are preprogrammed into our brains. Primal fear or super fears that few people can overcome. The third technique selftalk helps focus the trainee’s thoughts.

The average person speaks to themselves at a rate of 300 to 1000 words a minute. If these words are positive instead of negative, can do instead of can’t, they help override the fear signal coming from the amygdala. The frontal lobes are always on, so it’s very easy to think about something difficult, something bad like I’m going to fail. What am I doing here? I didn’t practice enough. What you’re trying to do is you’re trying to replace those bad thoughts with good thoughts. So remember selftalk when you talk about concentration and you’re repeating it to yourself, that’s selftalk and you’re flexing that muscle or that skill concentration. All right, let’s talk about the guiding principles of wandering chatter. It’s very important. And I believe top athletes, I don’t know if you actually have a conversation about this with yourself or with a mental performance coach, but it’s worthy of talking about.

And that is the drift. You know, in some of our other classes, we quantify thought. You need to check that out with the TEA course, the Navy SEALs course. We teach you or we quantify thought, right? So to cut to the chase, it’s five to 16 thoughts a second. Now we’re talking about wandering chatter. That’s it right there. I mean, 16. Can you imagine that? Five thoughts a second is where we’re at when we’re relaxed and in that relaxation mode. 16 thoughts a second. We don’t use the word thoughts, do we? Come on, pictures, words and pictures flashing, right? So five to 16. I need you to swallow that big pill. So the drift is a human factor. Top performing athletes have recognized that when the drift comes, they bring it back on task. They stay on task. They concentrate, they repeat, they focus. And when the mind drifts, they bring it back on task. Now, the key here is to do this before your competition, during your competition, and after your competition. The exercise that I’m going to give you to strengthen the skill of concentration is something you have to do every day throughout the day if you want it to be there for you benefit you in your performance.

So let’s talk about that. Here’s what’s going to happen on a wandering mind. We’re going to talk about the concentration skill and how do you flex the skill. Here’s how it’s going to work you’re going to be aware of yourself trying to focus on A, whatever A is. It could be athletics, it could be anything, really, family, finances. Your mind will drift, right? Now you’re thinking about B, C, and D. That used to frustrate me. There. I used to get a hijack just because I couldn’t focus. You might be the same way. Recognize, here it is every time you bring a wandering mind back on task, every time if your mind drifts, human, and you bring it back and you put it back on those words or those pictures, that task, that’s like a rep in the way room.

You’re literally strengthening your skill of concentration, which little by little incrementally gets you to a high level of performance. The idea is you want to be able to flex this muscle, this skill of concentration all day long. So, you want to be intentional again. Some of the new exercises here is again just when you recognize you drifted, be intentional now bringing it back, and again, that develops the skill of concentration. So, you bring a wandering mind back on task. It’s like taking the brain into the weight room. Now, this is a good time to bring in the attention disorders, right? Wandering chatter, having trouble focusing, having trouble concentrating. I’m not even going to list them. Those disorders are real, right? They’re actually chemical imbalances. We’re going to talk about the amygdala later. It has a lot to do with hormones in your system. Okay, that’s all real.

But the mental skill of communication, just like the mental skill of concentration, are skills. And any skill can be developed with practice. So if you have any of these disorders, you’re still in the game. You just have to work a little harder. That’s the simple to this. You can still be an elite athlete and sharpen your skills, deliver your talent, and summon your talent at will with your skills. Building of these specific skills, regardless if you have a disorder. Okay. Now, I say that in the context of attention disorders, right? We’re talking about the mental skill of concentration.

The bottom line to it is you’re going to have to compete at a new level. In order to get you to a new level of competition, we’ve got to better understand these critical thinking skills, the ability to keep the mind on that task. More importantly, when it drifts, bring it back. So, the mental skill of concentration is critical for you to get to your optimal, your zone states consistently over time. So, we’re going to continue to flex this muscle and work on this regardless of where we’re at.