It hasn’t exactly been a big secret that I have been having some difficulties with focus. Partially situational. OK, it’s a hefty part. A lot of it is chronic though. I have never been very good at concentrating on one thing for long.
I haven’t ever had to.
It sounds like the worst sort of humble brag to say that one of my biggest ongoing intellectual challenges is that my intelligence level enables me to cover up my lack of focus by making me good enough at most things that I can deal with them before my lack of concentration is revealed. In other words, because I am quick thinking, I can most often get away with being scatterbrained.
Maybe it won’t seem so much like bragging if I point out how badly that paragraph is written. Or that in the last 30 minutes I have stopped writing at least 20 times to: play Words With Friends, take off my socks and throw them on the floor, brush my teeth, try to read a short story, picked up my socks and put them in the laundry basket, gotten up to brush my teeth because I forgot I already did, put on hand lotion and on and on. I could say that it’s atypical, but it isn’t. It’s how I do everything, including writing.
I can read for hours at a time, it’s true, but if I do I often alternate between different books. If a book really catches me, I might read it in a day, but usually I am reading at least two or three things at a time. That’s just been over the last year. I am hoping my reading concentration comes back.
On the other hand, I usually listen to music or put on an old movie while I read…so maybe my concentration has never been as good with recreational reading as I think it used to be. I have always been terrible at reading for content. Technical manuals are a curse. College reading was a chore, even though I read very fast. I often got by with skimming the reading and then highlighting the important parts. The night before an exam, I would “study” by re-reading the highlighted parts, and my notes from class.
Except that my notes were mostly doodles interspersed with seemingly random words that I somehow decided were worth writing down.
I got really good grades, too. How? I have no idea. It sort of points out the general unfairness of life, don’t you think? Or perhaps it is just because schools in the US aren’t that great?
So what, right?
Boo fucking hoo.
Do you suppose that “I can’t concentrate” is about the stupidest problem a person could admit to? I have a good job. I own a house. My car is paid for. It is not like my alleged inability to concentrate is costing me…anything. Or is it?
If I actually worked at it? Could I be a super genius? Is it a bad thing that I don’t try harder to do something about it? Am I failing myself in some way?
Am I really just lazy and coasting?
Wait, what? Sorry, I was putting on some Chapstick.