Monday, August 19, 2013

The Value of Concentration

I don't normally write while I have music playing; I don't know what it is about music, but it always seems to distract me. I remember reading a study – or maybe I didn't even read it, maybe it was just relayed to me... come to think of it, I have no idea how this piece of information came to be in my head, but here I go, about to spurt it out as sheer fact – that said that classical music is the best to study to, and hip hop and house the worst. The reason for this was that the strong beats are distracting to the mind, and constantly vie for attention over the thoughts that we're supposedly concentrating on. Classical music has no heavy beat, or repetitively percussive beat like much of the popular music of the modern era, and so it wins out.

Right now I'm writing this while listening to Alle Farben's 'Fusion Secret Gig 2013 Mixtape' which is full of disco-house and heavy 4/4 drums... I don't want to jump the gun here, but as far as cogency and train of thought, we seem to be going fairly well. Oh... nope, self-referencing... not good... getting meta... having to refer to the present in order to come up with material here. Maybe I spoke too soon?

So I was talking about how I can never concentrate with music on: when I was in Bolivia I remember sitting in a cafe in La Paz after being denied entry into numerous hostels and driven around by a taxi driver clearly extorting us for two hours' cab fare. The cafe was the only one in the city that we knew was a twenty-four hour affair, and it was about 6am, so we went in and decided to wait out the time until the internet cafe opened and I could receive an email from my host-brother containing my passport documents which would allow us to finally check in to a hostel. As we sat there, I saw Sandrine, a lovely French woman who I spent a lot of time with, pull out a book and pop in her headphones before commencing reading. She was listening to music WHILE reading... this I could not wrap my head around, but apparently women can multi-task?

So another study... this one seems a bit more reputable in my memory, and without checking google right now, (what a weak move that would be) I'm going to say with a fair degree of confidence that this one is steeped in real fact. This study claimed that the barely-noticeable flickering of fluorescent lights distracted the male mind to such an extent as to make study underneath one impossible for us dual-chromosome-wielding dullards. Urban myth states that women can multi-task, while men cannot, but this study gave a clear, demonstrable example of a situation where the difference could be observed. Fluorescent lights, you old devils, you.

This music is really fucking great, I don't want to turn it off, but as I near what feels like the end of this disjointed and ultimately undirected rant, one thing is becoming clear – I am not concentrating.

You win again, un-researched, possibly made-up science. Victory is yours, and to the victor, go the spoils. What the fuck am I talking about? None of the words in those last two sentences meant FUCKING ANYTHING WHATSOEVER. This has been a struggle guys... I think I'm going to have a nap. I just had a fucking cold shower too... fuck.

Peace, Taco.

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