When I started my podcast, I didn’t want to talk about covid in my episodes. But its pretty omnipresent, so I have to go there sometimes.
Today I am going to talk about how Covid ADD is a thing for me and my coaching students.
We went back to church in the last month or two, and my 15 year old mentioned, “Wow, I am out of practice. Church feels so long.” And it is even shorter than it used to be by well over an hour!
General Conference in April, I was able to watch all the sessions and focus.
October Session – it was a lot harder to sit that long.
I am not sure exactly why it feels like I have ADD. I guess being out of practice is one thing.
For me it is also I got in the habit of checking the news or social media for updates and now that is part of my daily routine. But there is no routine about it, except whenever I have downtime I do that. My brain is used to being fed a constant stream of fast information.
What can we do? Let’s try using the AWARE tool.
Aware – hmm, I have COVID ADD.
Wonder – Interesting, I wonder what is causing this. Being curious can help me see the possible reasons. When covid started I started checking the news obsessively. I got into that habit and it has been hard to break.
Accept – I can see why this has happened. I am kind to myself about it.
Respond – What do I want to create? More focused attention. For me that would look like being able to read a book for an hour without getting distracted.
Execute – Practice reading every day. Put all digital devices away. Set a timer for an hour. Go sit far away from them with a PAPER book, or my kindle paperwhite. NOT the kindle app on my phone. Read. When it gets hard and I want to distract myself, go through those steps briefly and then keep executing.
Hopefully by practicing to expand my attention with one thing that I love to do, it will naturally increase in other areas as well.