The ability of a person to focus on something is what we mean by concentration. Ability to concentrate is depended on many factors which includes external environment and the persons own mindset, and hence developing concentration is not an easy task at all. Concentration is all about disciplining our mind so as to improve our focus. But every mind loves to wander in its own freedom, and hence it will try to resist your efforts to concentrate. There are a lot of simple exercises that takes only 10 to 15 minutes, which when done regularly you can train your brain and discipline your mind. These simple exercises when done on a daily basis can help min improving your concentration.
Setting the mood to do the exercise is very important for doing these mind exercises. First thing to do is to find a place where you can be at peace of mind, being alone without any kind of disturbances. Select any suitable position to sit. You can either sit cross legged on the floor or can sit on a chair. Just make sure that your spine is erect. Relax your body by taking deep breaths and try to bring your concentration to the exercise. In the beginning you can start with doing these exercises for 10 minutes. Later as you proceed, you can lengthen the time to 15 minutes after a few weeks of training.
Concentration Exercises for your Mind:
Book Exercise:
This is one of the simplest exercises to improve the concentration. Take a book and then start to count the number of words in a single paragraph. You can count them again so that you can ensure that you have counted correctly. When you complete with one paragraph, move on to count two paragraphs. The tricky part is that you are not supposed to use your fingers to count. You should count mentally or only using your eyes. Go on increasing the level by counting the number of words in a page.
Backward Exercise:
Counting backwards is another simple mind exercise. Count backward for hundred to one in your mind. When you are able to do it with ease, then raise the difficulty level by counting backward by skipping numbers in between. For example count 100, 97, 94, 91, 88 etc by skipping three numbers in between. Increase the difficulty level gradually as you proceed.
Mind count Exercise:
Another simple way to gain concentration is by selecting a simple word or sound and then thinking about it in your mind. Repeat the word or sound in your mind for five minutes. When your mind reaches a condition where it can easily concentrate on this, try increasing the time period to 10 minutes and so on.
Thoughts Exercise:
Another thing you can do is to try suppressing your thoughts for at least five minutes. It seems to be a difficult thing to do, but through regular practise, you can easily achieve this. This is one the difficult concentration exercises. You can start off by staying blank in mind for one minute, and later you can gradually increase the time period. Try to stay blank in your mind without any kind of thoughts. You will take time to do this exercise perfectly, but gradually you can improve and along with that you can increase your concentration too.
Chair Exercise:
For this exercise, sit on a chair with your head up, shoulders back and chin out. Now keep your right hand raised up to the level of the shoulder and pointing towards right. Now moving only your head, fix your gaze on the fingers of this raised hand. Make sure you keep your arms perfectly still for one minute. After this you can repeat the same with your left hand. As you proceed, you can increase the time period from one minute to five minutes. It would be easier if you keep your palm downwards when you keep your hands outstretched.
Examination Exercise:
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This exercise is aimed at improving our focus. Take any fruit such as apple, orange or banana in hand and deeply examine it from all angles. There might be many irrelevant thoughts that come to your mind. Things such as the place from where you bought it, the nutritive value of the fruit etc might carry you away, but you should try to stay calm and ignore all such irrelevant thoughts. Just bring all your focus on to the fruit and think only about its shape, smell, taste and the feel you get by touching the fruit.
Glass Exercise:
To do this exercise all you need is a glass of water. Hold the glass in front of you using your fingers of one hand. Focus your attention on the glass by fixing your eyes on the glass. You should try to keep your arms steady so that you see no movements in the water. In the beginning do this exercise for one minute, later on you can increase it to five minutes. Do this with one arm at a time and then with the other.
Object Exercise:
Take any small object in your hand. You can take anything such as a spoon, cup or a glass. Concentrate on this object in your hand by looking at it from all sides without creating any words in your mind. Try not to think anything about this object and just concentrate on watching this object closely.
Visualize Exercise:
This is an exercise that you can do when you master the exercises mentioned above. All you need to do is to draw a small geometrical figure on a paper and then paint it with any color. You can draw anything such as a triangle, circle or rectangle. Now keeping away all unrelated thoughts and distractions simply concentrate on this figure by looking at it. Do this without straining your eyes. When you have done this, close your eyes and visualize the image of the figure in your mind.
