What is the 'Focus Enhancement Program'?
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Focus Enhancement is first of its kind personal transformation program in India, where we help a student age 13+ to transform into a highly focused version of himself/herself over a time span of 3-6 months. In the program we work with the student closely at a one to one level and help him/her:
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Increase concentration levels & attention spans
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Increase duration & consistency of effort
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Overcome procrastination
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Destroy old habits & create new productive ones
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Reduce digital distractions
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Create & follow effective plans
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Create effective preparation strategy
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Develop a growth mindset
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Stay motivated and joyful
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Gain more control on their thoughts
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Why 'Focus Enhancement'?
The traditional education systems focus on developing only one aspect of the mind, which is the intellect. As a result, most students by the time they enter their teenage face difficulties in focusing on academics. This is because they haven't developed the mother of all skills; 'The ability to hold one's attention on whatever one wants at will'.
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This systemic issue when coupled with factors such as cut-throat competition, easily available digital distractions, busy school & college routines presents a steep challenge for many students and eventually leads to:
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Poor achievement in comparison to the potential & talent the student has
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Beginning of mental health issues due to stress and fear of failure
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Students subconsciously defining their capabilities based on where they stand in the competition.
The focus enhancement program helps students rewire their brain towards new mental models and action that helps directly counter the above-mentioned issues. The core idea of the 'Focus
Enhancement' program is to help a student improve academic performance without the process taking a toll on the student's mental health.
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How is the Program Conducted?
The program can be taken in one of the three modes mentioned below:
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Virtually (online) through video sessions
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Face to face at one one of our centers (Mumbai/Navi Mumbai)
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In premises of a partnering organization
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A typical 3-month program is organized in the following manner:
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14 once a week sessions of 90 mins. duration
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A 15 min. touch base once/twice a week during the 3 months
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Plenty of home-based activities
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Progress tracking & performance enhancement frameworks
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AV tools for learning & practicing the meditative exercises
How exactly does this program help a student
How exactly does this program help a student?
More than a program, 'Focus Enhancement' is a game or a competition, where the student competes with himself/herself over a period of 3-6 months.
Every student's performance is measured every week based on preset criteria and the student is challenged every week to push the envelope. The challenges are designed to enable small but steady improvements every week.
Our programs are typically 3-6 months long. One of the mains reasons for this structure is that this gives us time to bring about the internal transformation of a student which is extremely necessary to drive external action.
Though a major part of the program curriculum is structured and planned, there is a good 40% that is customized as per every student. This enables us to take into account every students unique personality, aspirations, motivations and unique strengths and areas of improvement.
What tools does the program use?
There are 6 key tools the program uses to bring about the transformation in the students. These tools work collectively throughout the program duration both during the weekly sessions and in the time students spend at home. The details of each of these tools are provided below.
Meditative Exercises
This perhaps is the most important tool and lies at the core of the program. The main goal of this exercise is to enable a student to achieve a complete thoughtless & exuberant state of mind twice a day. The Mastery exercise is specially designed meditative practice that works at different levels of the mind-body ecosystem of a student. This exercise is a carefully designed combination of techniques from the yogic systems, vipassana philosophy as well some techniques we have designed in house at Antarlakshya. These exercises are primarily designed to bring about the following changes in the student:
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Training the mind to hold attention in one place
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Activating the energy centers to make a student more energetic
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Calming down and stabilizing the mental chatter
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Freeing the mind of negative thought patterns
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Restarting & rejuvenating the mind
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Producing natural optimism
This exercise increases in duration and complexity every week. The student is provided with a new audio file every week to facilitate regular practice as well as to keep them engaged throughout the program. The practice of this exercise is tracked using a framework. Here is a sample audio file for the week 4 mastery exercise.
Know Your Mind Sessions
'Know Your Mind' is a very important tool used in every session. It is a 20 min. section in every session that serves the following purpose of educating students on the workings of their mind. Here are the key highlights of this tool.
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It is designed to give students an understanding of key aspects of their mind & teach them how to focus
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This section is designed to use simple logical diagrams and real-life examples to explain the workings of certain aspects of the human mind
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The imagery and models used in this section have purposely designed to be consistent in design & colors across the entire program to help students retain better
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The visuals are designed in such a way that it makes easy for students to visualize what happens in their minds which aids meta-cognition
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One other important purpose of this section is to make a logic based case for them to be persistent at their meditative practice. This section helps us logically convince students why meditative exercises are extremely important and thus result in higher adoption rates in students
Below are some sample screenshots from a few of these sessions.
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Motivational Counselling
Motivational counseling is the glue that holds all the other tools together. It builds on the mutual trust between the mentor and the student. This is where we rely on our understanding of students' unique personality and strengths. We work with them relentlessly to support them in their pursuit of their goals. This includes listening to their concerns as a friend or comforting them during tough situations and also pushing them out of their comfort zones to get the task done.
The program is designed in such a way that each week represents a new theme. The learning material, mastery exercises, know your mind sessions are all designed in sync. with these themes. Each theme is a key idea that the student has to internalize over the course of the program. The counseling sessions build also upon these themes.
Inner Insights Activities
Here are the key highlights of this tool:
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These activities play a key role in helping students step back from the daily rut and turn inward.
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The primary goal of these activities is to help students a deeper understanding of who they are, what really matters to them, what scares them, what motivates them and what are their strengths
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Depending on the nature of the activity, some are done in the session, in the presence of the mentor and some are alotted as home-based assignments
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When equipped with this knowledge about the self, students find it easier to develop the clarity and conviction to up their game in their pursuit of excellence
Below are some sample screenshots that will give you a better idea of this tool.
Performance Enhancement Techniques
Performance enhancement techniques are a very important part of the program. The program stresses on students regularly practicing these techniques at home and also helps them track the practice. These include some techniques that are very specifically designed to improve academic performance and others that are more towards improving capabilities of the mind and the body. These techniques are interspersed across the 14 sessions and are introduced to the students every week(in sync with the weekly themes) These techniques include are broadly organized in the below 8 areas:
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Increasing attention spans
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Overcoming distracting thoughts during preparation
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Memorizing effectively
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Planning effectively
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Increase academic productivity
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Keeping energy levels high
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Controlling impulses and instant gratifications
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Visualizing process and scenarios for better performance
Progress Tracking Frameworks
Progress tracking is the most critical part of the program. Continuous monitoring is extremely essential for students to get the best results out of the program. Right from the first week, the program makes the student accountable for his/her performance tracking. In addition to the student, we also sometimes interact with the parents weekly to validate the data provided by students. Performance tracking is centered around the following areas:
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Weekly productivity
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Duration, efficiency, effectiveness, and consistency of effort
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Happiness levels
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Tracking performance improvement in exams and tests
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Consistency in avoiding instant gratifications
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Weak areas in preparation
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Effective implementation of mastery exercise
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Academic coverage
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Effective implementation of performance enhancement techniques
Below are some sample snapshots of a few of the frameworks.
Student success stories
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My daughter used to be extremely anxious & worried about giving her CA IPCC May 2018 attempt. She had even thought of skipping the attempt as she was extremely low on confidence. We came to know about Antarlakshya through a relative and asked her to join the focus enhancement program in February 2018. The mentors provided timely help to my daughter. She became extremely confident, calm and composed. They assisted her in such a way that she appeared and cleared her exam in first attempt.
- Mrs Umangi R (parent)
When I began the program, I was putting about 3 hours of effort daily. Though I wanted to do much more, I couldn't as I had become used to spending 3-4 hours of time daily on YouTube, Facebook and playing mobile games. This program helped me reduced the time spent on distractions by 70-80% . In a span of a 6 weeks I was able to take my daily study duration to 8 hours on an average;sometimes even 10-11 hours. The program, especially the mastery meditations helped me reduced anxiety that is generated during exams. The visualizations techniques was the best part as it worked really well for me. Also I feel I got a lot more control of myself after doing this program. Thanks to the program, I am 100% off social media and I am feeling very good about this change!
-Akhilesh P(CA Aspirant)
The program taught me a refreshingly new approach to improve focus which helped me get rid of social and digital distractions and focus on academics like never before. What I have learnt in the program not just helped me in my exams but will also help me in my life overall.
-Vinay S(Cleared NPAT NMIMS)
Chinmayi has scored 90% in her board exams. She was very relaxed during her exams and also even before getting the results. Your sessions and exercises have really contributed to her confidence levels. Thank you again.
- Mrs. Shetty -Parent
I had become stressed as my 9th marks were very less. I used to prepare a lot but I would forget everything when I would start writing the papers. The study techniques given in the program helped me overcome this fear. The mastery exercise helped me reduce my worry about how I will do in exams. In my last exams, I did not experience any blacking out. The topics about how the mind works we discussed in every session were also very interesting. I now make better use of my time for studies but I also have a lot of fun.
Vishwajeet K (Std.10)-From 72% in grade 9 to 88% in grade 10
Who conducts the programs?
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Supriya Samant
Supriya is a Chartered Accountant and B.Com degree holder. Before dedicating her time in creating Antarlakshya, she has worked for over 6 years with Pricewaterhouse Coopers Private Limited (PwC) and Mukund M. Chitale & Co. as a tax consultant for many global fortune 500 companies. Supriya's expertise to guide and motivate students comes from her grounded nature and the ability to appreciate, nurture and celebrate people for what they are.