Attention Span Crisis Idon’t know ever since when, I found it’s difficult to fouse on something for a certain period of time. My mind always roam freely or gets easily distracted while reading an article. As a result, I found less interest in reading and inability to carry some indepth thoughts. I’ve read similar articles on the similar issue, I couldn’t help but wonder, what happened to our mind? Our attention and focus? Can it last longer? Is it because the article is not interesting enough? Maybe. A well-plotted movie catches our attention from beginning to the end. Likewise, a better written passage might help, but this is not the ultimate remedy in case when we all have to read some serious articles that is not only meant for fun. Somepeople say that mini-blog is to blame for our short attention span, as no more than 70 words are allowed in a mini-blog. As shakespear put, “Brevity is the soul of wit”. Probably he foresaw the come-ionto-being of Tweeters.

　　There is another possible culprit as I see it---the boundless information in the internet and the way how they’re orgnized. Specifically, we “float” on the sea of the internet: we open a website, click some links that’s eyecatching and then jump to another topic irrelevent at all. I myself habitully spend 30 minutes or even more per day to browse those fleeting messages that happening around the world everyday. See what I’ve got today: Gigi(Liang Yongqi) is said to get a split-up with her diplomat boyfriend; Bieber held a concert in somewhere I can’t remember… To my astonishment, half an hour online left me nothing but some fleeting messages. It’s “fast food” I’m consuming, and nutrition is the problem if I start everyday like this. The bigger problem is you find it hard to resist the window popped up everytime you open QQ that dutifully inform you the latest news in society. Maybe limiting the time we open our QQ or other recreational softwares is the way to go.

　　In contrast, it’s much more rewarding when I spend longer time on fewer topics and study some of them a little bit more. A translation of a 80 minutes Harvard class helps me realize it. When I finished my translation, the essence of this lecture kept in my mind. I remember he said, self-confidence can be divided into 3 kinds, dependent, independent and unconditional. And I discoved in my life that I’m always dependent on what others say rather than thinking critically on my own, and I’m confident only when others appreciate me. So it helps. A deep and through study on fewer objects might be time-consuming but proved to be more rewarding. You’re digesting it instead of swallowing it. Your thoughts are focused rather than diverged. You benefit from it in your real life. This is the start where you can develop your longer attention.

　　Surfing on the surface is what we need to be informed and entertained, while going down and deep in the water diving is more helpful in making us a man that can “suck the marrow of life”, as Thoreau captures.

　　There must be other explainations and remedies to this attention crisis, and I’m gonna start tomorrow to prolong this span. The first step is no QQ online upon starting up my PC.