Why I’m able to study 4 hours with NO breaks (how to stay productive)

What is up guys karma medic here and welcome back to another dose we need to the channel hi My name is Nasir and I'm now a third year medical student studying at King's College, London Today's video is all about why I study in for our flocks and I'm not talking about four hours of half studying a little bit Of procrastinating and chillin here and there I'm talking about four hours of productive efficient studying in a row now Usually when people find out that I study in 4 hour blocks as opposed to 25 minutes or 1 hour 2 hour even 3 hour Blocks most of them tell me that's not possible.

There's no way you can stay focus for that long. You probably aren't efficient You're probably wondering in your mind and things like that but honestly I genuinely study for 4 hours in a row, and I'm Motivated and I'm productive and I'm efficient and I'm gonna explain all of that in today's video I'm gonna explain two things one why I study in 4 hour blocks and 2 how I study in for our vlogs so let's tackle the why first when I sit down on my desk over here or in the library in order to study What is my goal my goal is to complete as much work as possible to be as productive and as efficient as possible Now me personally when I get into the zone for studying, I don't want to leave that zone.

I don't want to get up I don't wanna Procrastinate I don't want to change what it is that I'm doing because I've already done the most difficult part of sitting down to study Which is to get into the studying mood and zone and the more breaks that I take or reasons I give myself to get up And off of my desk, that's another opportunity for me to have to get back into the studying zone Which I don't want to do so generally speaking when I'm studying for exams I do two four-hour blocks in my day from 9 to 1 and from 3 to 7 And that way I only have to enter the studying mood 2 times once at 9 a.m.

And once at 1 p.m Now this is the main reason that I personally don't use the Pomodoro timer because every 25 minutes It's basically giving me an excuse and encouraging me to check my phone or to chill or to get up off my desk or whatever Which is inevitably gonna lead to me procrastinating and doing something for longer than just 5 minutes one thing that I really like about my method of doing to 4 hour blocks in my day is that I've done pretty much all The work that I need to do by 7 p.m Now I imagine doing eight hours of productive and useful work and also being done by 7 p.m That leaves so much free time in order for you to do anything else that you want that can be exercised socialising with friends playing video games making YouTube videos or basically anything you just give yourself a lot of free time and Still do lots and lots of work during the day Now I understand obviously different studying techniques and timetables and schedules and whatever work for different people I'm just saying as far as maximizing efficiency If you condense All of the work that you have to do into the beginning part of the day that leaves a lot of hours at the end Of the day for you to do whatever you want All right.

I think I've preached long enough now about why I really like my four-hour block method now Let me tell you how it is that I can actually stay focused and work for four hours in a row I'm gonna break this down into five key sections the first is to plan the night before and what I mean by this is that when I wake up in the morning and I Know that I'm gonna start studying at 9:00 a.m. I've already decided exactly what it is that I'm going to do at 9:00 a.m Which means that there's no friction or no time wasted in trying to figure out what do I need to study? What have I done enough of what is left for me to do etc, etc I've already decided that unplanted the night before so when I sit down at 8:59 I start exactly at 9:00 and I can get immediately into the studying zone That is actually really really key If you're struggling to get into the study zone have a predetermined plan of what it is that you're gonna do during that time So for example tomorrow at 9 a.m.

I'm going to study for the USMLE exam, which is here So tonight before I go to sleep I'm going to open this book to the page that I'm going to be starting on tomorrow And I'm gonna put a pen inside of it that way tomorrow when I take this book Which is already laying on my desk in a nice and convenient place for me to begin work I can literally flip open to the page of exactly where I'm going to start on top of that You can see on my desktop over here, but I'm already gonna go down to the video that I'm gonna watch tomorrow morning I'm gonna open it and it's gonna be ready Just waiting for me to sit down hit play and begin work section number two Don't give yourself a reason to get up and away from your desk before I start work at 9:00 a.m I've already made my cup of coffee I've got in a couple of snacks and I've organized everything around me that I will possibly need in the next four hours So that I can minimize the amount of times that I need to get up and out of my chair The reason that I do this is because every time you get up and out of your chair, you're giving yourself Opportunity for distraction and reason for procrastination for example, if I go to the kitchen, I'll make myself a snack or a drink I'll knock on my sister's door and ask her what's going on Let's have a chat every time I leave my room and I leave that studying zone and studying environment I'm giving myself reasons and excuses and opportunities for procrastination.

Now this is gonna be slightly controversial I'm sure but I honestly don't allow myself to get up and out of my desk until I've done an hour of studying the thought Process that I have in my mind is not if I haven't been able to sit down and do productive solid work for an hour Do I really deserve to go take a break? Do I really deserve to go for crostini and fill up my drink and get more snacks or take some time off? No I need to first do a bunch of productive work before I can even think about the idea of getting up and procrastinating and usually when I push myself to stay that extra 15 minutes I actually end up studying for another 30 minutes or 45 minutes or whatever before getting out of my chair because I want to finish For example the video that I'm doing or the section that I'm doing or the page that I'm writing I just give myself reasons to continue studying.

You know, I'm almost done with this section. I'm almost done with this video I'm almost done with blah blah blah blah blah and I just try my best to keep myself situated out my desk You know what now that I say all of this out loud, I'm starting to sound a little bit crazy but just stay with me here the point of section number two is to only get up and off of your desk when you really Need to section number three is for the love of God. Just get rid of your phone Your phone is your worst enemy when it comes to studying time If you hear any notification if you hear a buzzing if you even look at your phone or if you even think of your phone You're so likely to just without even thinking reach over and grab it and check it I'm guilty of doing this all the damn time And because I'm a human and I'm prone to checking my phone and getting all of these addicting Notifications and numbers and messages.

I have two ways in order to completely eliminate my phone from my studying environment step Number one is to put your phone out of sight If you can't see your phone, you're less likely to think of it you're less likely to notice it and you're just less likely to check it overall step number two is to put your phone out of Reach that creates a huge barrier you have to now get up and move in order to get your phone Which I know sounds kind of stupid you're probably like Oh, it's just two steps away over there on the bed But the truth is when you're sitting down any extra effort or friction you give yourself in order to go check your phone You're gonna do it less often Wow, I've been talking a lot this video All right section number four is about giving yourself rewards while you're studying genuinely No joke, probably what gets me through studying sessions the most is the idea of Rewarding myself with either something to drink or something to eat or going out with my friends or playing video games or whatever Just having these rewards that I make for myself that I can only unlock once I've done a certain amount of studying It's for example Like I mentioned before I literally don't allow myself to go get a refill of my coffee or brew a tea or anything like that Until I've done at least an hour of studying.

It's just now an ingrained rule in my head like dude You're not gonna have coffee or more tea unless you do more work So you better get that done first if that's what you want to do My mentality when it comes to doing for our blocks is very simple if I work from 0 till 2 hours Well, then all I have to do is do the exact same thing that I just did one more time And I'll be done with my four-hour block It's the same thing like when I go for a 10k run if I run five kilometres in one direction away from my house well Then I kind of have to run the other five kilometres in the opposite direction to get back home and that way when I sit down for a four-hour block of studying really all I need to focus on is getting through the next two hours because once I've done two hours well Then I just have to repeat what I've already done and I'll be done with four hours I know it sounds really simple and it sounds kind of stupid You guys probably think I'm crazy right now But if I just do two hours of studying, then I can repeat what I've done and then I've reached my goal Okay, and the fifth and final section is about setting standards for yourself for me personally Once I've done a four-hour block of studying I know that that is something that I am now capable of and so next time I come to studying if I if I study For three hours or two hours then I'm like, well, this isn't really as best as I can Do this isn't pushing myself to my maximum efficiency or capacity? I've done a four hour book before that means that I'm capable of doing it again and I keep up that standard and I keep Studying for our blocks because I know that I can reach that level of capacity and productivity It's the same thing like once I've done a ten kilometer run.

I know that I'm capable of running ten kilometres And so I keep running ten kilometres every time because now that's my new baseline. That's what I'm capable of achieving I don't like to give myself excuses or reasons to do something out of lesser level than what I've done before I feel like I've done it once I'm capable of doing that and so I can keep up that standard now Obviously, you can probably see with a slippery slope that comes along with this line of thinking.

I'm not crazy I'm a robot I obviously have times when I can't study for 4 hours if I follow everything that I'm saying about 80% of the time then I'm doing a fantastic job because the other 20% is just real life things happen Things come up you need to change and you need to be flexible, but this is my line of thinking This is my philosophy. And this is when I try to upkeep as much as I possibly can. Okay, and that is it I hope you guys have found this video useful. I hope you've enjoyed it and if you did please do leave a like on this video and subscribe to my channel to see more content from me in the future if you have any tips for how you like to study or Know something that works very well for you and would like to share with the rest of the community Please do so in a comment down below I love reading and replying to all of your comments and that is it for me I will see you guys in the next video.

Peace You What video are we doing to date why I study in for our blocks? Let's go.

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