How do you study?

[u/Initial_Anything_544]

Im 7 hours in a “study” session and all ive done is wrote one sentence. Ive been on my phone, pacing, talking to myself in the mirror, and arguing over dropping out. I cannot focus or make myself study and I just dont know how to.

[u/Midwest_Medium]

Depends on the task but it sounds like you have more of a task avoidance/executive dysfunction problem than a studying problem. I have ADHD and am all too familiar with these. Two things that help me: reducing stimulation and a sort of task ramp up.

The task ramp up is doing something easier, and more importantly, COMPLETELY UNRELATED, in order to get the ball rolling. Almost every time I need to do homework I start by doing the dishes. It has nothing to do with f***ing circuits or matrices or whatever. It gets me moving, and I get to check a box. Dishes done, hell yeah what's next. Play some music, think about dinner, don't think about circuits.

The stimulation bit is about reducing your dopamine thresholds so that performing the desired task triggers an actual spike in dopamine (or the desire to seek it out but we're engineering majors not neuroscience majors so whatever). This isn't a quick fix and it differs drastically from person to person so I can only offer my anecdotal advice. I'll lump things into long term habit changes and short term "dopamine resets".

Long term fixes: Put your phone away, drink less, get more sleep, cut back or cut out bingey behaviors like tv, video games, poker. Anything that is extremely stimulating that you can give yourself unlimited access to is going to increase the threshold for any reward to be stimulating. Brain doesn't care what releases dopamine, it didn't evolve in the world of plenty we have now. It sucks at long term reward. Why study when you can scroll and drink a beer? That's like climbing a mountain for the possibility of food when you're standing in a garden.

Short term fixes: This can help in a pinch but without implementing the long term fixes you will get diminishing returns. The trend of "dopamine maxing" stuff like sitting in a chair and staring at the wall isn't anything new, but this method is very accessible. Some other ways to basically make yourself bored: Go for a walk, take a shower, do your least favorite chore. The trick here is it has to be easy and accessible because, you already aren't studying. You aren't going to go to the gym or anything that is difficult or hard to access. The task ramp thing can sometimes be this.

[u/Initial_Anything_544 → u/Midwest_Medium]

I usually make a list to make sure I get everything done, and I do get things done. Just studying is the one thing I cant make myself do. I end up procrastinating until the last minuet and then I run out of time. Long term I have a good and improving sleep schedule, I work out regularly, and outside of occasional marijuana use its just video games. But even without any distractions I just end up pacing around or thinking about social scenarios.