My attention span is quite short. Something is constantly changing the direction of my attention. Whether it’s a notification, background music, or just another random thought, most of the time it doesn’t last long. But, when I am paying attention for an extended period of time, I really examine every part of it. With OCD, I find myself being forced to attend to more things than I agree to attend to. It pulls your attention in every direction. There is always a constant noise playing in the back of your head that demands immediate engagement. This makes it feel like I’m constantly focusing on at least two tasks at once. Most of the time the intrusive thoughts completely take over and strip my attention away from the current, important task. Digital media only enhances my short attention span as it is constantly leaving me with new thoughts to obsess over. I find myself either endlessly scrolling on social media or the exact opposite, only over analyzing one post or comment at a time.
On Monday, in my geography class, we watched a video about tsunamis, past tsunamis and potential future ones. There was a segment where the video explained the potential threat of a tsunami to the eastern U.S including New York, though it would be hundreds if not thousands of years before this natural disaster would occur. We were supposed to take notes and hand them in for an assignment but I was only able to write a few things down before my attention was completely turned to my safety from this potential tsunami. Notifications are also a huge disruptor to my attention. While I never am on my phone during class to ensure I am paying attention to the lesson, I have my apple watch that still sends notifications. On Wednesday, I logged every time I stopped paying attention to whatever the current task was at hand to look at or respond to the notification sent. This happened 53 times throughout the day with the number one notification being from snapchat. This is one of the things that I agree to attend to. This has made me more aware of media attention disruptors and moving forward not allowing myself to become distracted from notifications. Over the week I found many things that I both did agree to attend to as well as did not agree to attend to. The things that I did not agree to attend do have an impact on how I was able to “live my life” because of the pressures of the constant thoughts. But, the distractions that I do allow myself to attend have no hindrance on how I “live my life”. I feel as though distractions themselves are a part of life and how you choose to ignore or respond to them.