defeat the enemy, strongholds and spiritual warfare
Hey Friend!
How is your attention span? Do you feel a little dumb lately? I don’t mean to sound harsh, but this is no joke! Do you ever wonder where your brain went, or why you’re so forgetful? You’re not alone.
Lately, I’ve wondered why I can’t remember what I had for lunch yesterday, how to recall simple words, or why I can’t focus like I used to. My attention span is so short these days! Over the past 12 months, but more specifically over the last 90 days, I’ve wondered why this change is happening and if there’s something I can do to fix it.
Now I’m on a mission to increase my focus. Enough is enough of bright, shiny objects and little to no attention span!
For years, I have felt strongly about limiting social media and my phone usage (if you know you know), but I’ve drilled it down to five simple things that have helped me drastically improve my focus, memory, and attention span.
I have rolled them into a tidy, memorable (no pun intended) package called The B.E.B.E.S. Method.
Ready to dive in and bring your attention span back to life? Let’s go!
Let’s start with our acronym, B.E.B.E.S. Feel free to grab a sheet of paper and write them down your page. We will tackle each letter from top to bottom.
Increase Your Attention Span (B: Books)
When it comes to busy-ing our brains, we have two choices: we can lean on attention stealers or we can lean on focus-enhancers.
Attention stealers would include things like video games, phone notifications, endless reels, and social media scrolling. Focus-enhancers would include things like paper products, such as books, journals, devotionals, and the Bible.
According to a study from Frontiers, reading strengthens neural pathways involved in focus and comprehension. Reading engages your brain much more deeply than skimming digital content. It also allows you to re-train your brain to focus on one core concept at a time.
Sustained Attention for Brain Growth
The brain needs tasks that require sustained attention, such as reading or journaling. This is one of the most important things we can do as we try to heal our brains from our addictive tendencies to skim content. We already know that our brain is moldable, and we have the ability to change the way we process information, heal, and grow. We never stop learning, and I am so thankful for that!
I want to challenge you to come up with your focus-booster plan. For me, this looks like an hour-long time of prayer and devotional in the morning, versus picking up my phone. Don’t allow your brain to start the day with a big dopamine hit with swipes, clicks, and overstimulation. While a little bit of that every day is okay, I think we need to be more discerning of our time.
Another thing I’m doing that I would recommend you try is this: when I go to bed around 9:30 p.m., I spend about 30 minutes doing free time, such as watching YouTube videos that I enjoy. The last 30 minutes of my bedtime is spent reading a good book.
I haven’t been doing this very well lately, but my goal for 2025 is to read one book a month to equal twelve books this year. I have a 20 to 30-minute commitment to this every night. This helps me turn off my brain and also heal those focused parts of my brain that need this sustained attention.
What will you do? Write it down now for our letter B. What paper product will you incorporate into your day in exchange for screen time?
Increase Your Attention Span (E: Eat Healthy)
Your diet directly impacts your brain’s ability to focus. Our brains require specific nutrients for optimal performance. Whole foods, nuts, fatty fish, and protein are what we should be focused on. If God grew it, we should be eating it!
Processed foods were never part of our diet plan for a purposeful life! We should avoid sugar, food dyes, additives, bad oils, and the myriad of chemicals in our foods. Our processed foods are affecting our ability to think clearly.
For our letter E, I’d like you to focus on one to two swaps each day in your diet. Like many of you, I have been on a healthy food journey for about six years to get to a good place in my diet and confidence. If I could talk to myself years ago, I would ask, “What’s the one swap you can do today to be successful in healthy eating?” That might look like swapping the processed granola bar for eggs and oatmeal, or a Greek yogurt bowl with fruit.
Eating better will leave you looking and feeling better, but your focus will increase by supporting your brain health in this way.
Write down what your commitment is for the letter E. You can do this!
Increase Your Attention Span (B: Boundaries)
Limit your screen time to regain control of your attention span. Social media usage has been linked to decreased sustained attention. We’re not struggling to give social media or our phones our attention, we’re struggling to sustain attention on anything else, like our children, our spouse, or being present at dinner with family. Our phones will steal our attention from all of these things if we’re not disciplined about boundaries.
The enemy uses distraction as one of his favorite tools to prevent you from succeeding. The highest-paid ad executives in the world are using all the knowledge they have to keep you on your phones so they can make more money! But we have God on our side, am I right? We can use our discernment and the Holy Spirit to overcome this addiction and create boundaries around using our phones. Your phone is a tool, and maybe even a reward for yourself after completing important tasks in a day.
This may be the greatest culprit in why my attention span has been struggling. So what do we do about it?
Turn Phone Notifications Off
This is such an easy thing to do. It’s non-negotiable and there are zero excuses for why you aren’t doing this yet! Notifications go for all things social, email, and even text messages. I no longer receive any notifications on my phone until I decide to check them.
Set Check-In Times
I have a 15-minute check-in in the morning where I check notifications for work and my email. I’ll do this again around lunchtime and at the end of my workday. Then, I won’t touch my phone again until my workout time, which is my reward time to watch whatever I want for fun, like cooking videos on YouTube.
Partner Phone Reward with Productive Task
Just like I mentioned above with my workout, this teaches your brain that it’s a reward for doing something beneficial like working out, sitting in a sauna, folding laundry, or doing dishes. Those are the times when I allow myself to watch something mindless and enjoyable as a reward. For me, this is helpful because it trains my brain to look forward to a task that I otherwise wouldn’t want to do. It also relieves the pressure of wanting to grab my phone and do something pointless when I’m in a work block or spending intentional time with my kids.
Write down the one thing you’re going to do when it comes to boundaries with your phone.
You can also get into our community and let us know. I’d love to see a screenshot of your homework from this episode!
I made a full YouTube video on this exact topic, where I used a whiteboard and tactically mapped everything out. I always teach things 5% to 10% differently when I teach it a second time, so it might be wise to check that out and visually see how I teach this method!
Increase Your Attention Span (E: Exercise)
This won’t come as a big surprise to you, but exercise enhances cognitive performance and attention. It increases blood flow to your brain, which in turn increases your memory and focus. A study in Psychological Science found that aerobic exercise specifically increases our attention span.
So, how can you get daily movement in every day? My personal movement goal is 10,000 steps. Do I always hit that goal? No, but it’s something I strive for daily. Something that has helped me get more consistent in meeting this goal is my walking treadmill. Some days I work from my treadmill when I’m working on projects or task work, and before I know it, I have added 2,000 to 3,000 extra steps that day! If you work from home and that’s something you can budget or save up for, I would highly recommend it.
Try to view this daily movement goal as a way to boost your attention span. Find ways to walk away from your desk and walk around the house, go to the gym, play football with your kids, or take that CrossFit class at 5 a.m. (God bless those of you who do this!).
On your paper, write down your goal for daily movement and exercise.
Increase Your Attention Span (S: Sleep)
Quality sleep restores cognitive function and focus. The National Sleep Foundation found that sleep deprivation reduces attention and working memory. Working memory is when we forget that one word, or what we ate for dinner last night. We should strive to get 7 to 9 hours of quality sleep. It’s a time when we recharge and refuel our brains.
What will this look like for you?
First and foremost, get the screen away from your eyes before bed! I replaced my screen time at bedtime with a good book. I oscillate between a faith-based, parenting, or business book. If I’m not into the book by chapter two, I switch to another book that holds my attention for 30 minutes.
This swap has really helped me sleep better, and it can do the same for you. Stimulating your brain right before bed makes it very challenging to sleep. Anything we do has the ability to become a habit. Remember that everything we do is a choice.
Increase Your Attention Span: Glorify God in Your Habits
By the grace of God, we have been given free will and the Holy Spirit. So ask the Holy Spirit to lead your choices today to create habits that glorify God. If your habits are glorifying to God, you will likely make better choices. When we make choices that glorify God, we begin to create new routines that are more biblical in nature.
There is so much potential for all of us to improve the way we lead our lives. As Christians, we can take something as simple as focus and attention span, and take it back to a biblical place. Ask yourself this: Am I glorifying God by staring at my phone 4 hours a day? Is this helping me be an intentional, purposeful, woman? Is it helping me fulfill His calling in my life?
We have legacies to leave, friends! We have children to teach the way they should go. I don’t want to teach my kids that the way to go is into the phone or the abyss of a virtual world. No, thank you! I want our lives to be full of rich, deep connections. Full of time and intimacy with Christ. I want a fulfilling life of whole foods, movement, and health. I desire to be full of energy, give more to my business and church, and keep growing in my pursuit of all God has created me to be!
Increase Your Attention Span: Final Wrap-Up
It all begins with simple behavior changes in these five areas. Can you glorify God in what you are eating, in boundaries, in movement, and in the way you sleep? When you position it that way to yourself, you’ll feel the Holy Spirit’s direction as you make different choices that enhance your life, and in turn, improve your attention span.
Here’s a quick recap of our acronym and what each letter stands for.
B: Books
E: Eat Healthy
B: Boundaries
E: Exercise
S: Sleep
I’m so excited to see what God’s doing in your life and the dreams, goals, and visions He’s placing in your heart. I hope I can be a small part of making those visions a reality.
Don’t forget to join our Facebook community and share your new goals with us. We have lots of fun stuff planned for the year ahead!
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