Hands up if you’ve ever been studying or working or doing something that requires your concentration and you just can’t seem to make it more than five minutes before giving in to the flurry of random thoughts attacking your mind. Try as you may, you just can’t seem to get it together. To make matters worse, you try loading up on coffee, hoping it will keep you bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for the long hours ahead. To your dismay, coffee turns you into a jittery mess who - you guessed it – still can’t get it together….still can’t concentrate…still ain’t got no focus man.
I suggest you pull a switcheroo - matcha for coffee. What’s in it for you? For one, the jitters will flee. Though a cup of Matcha contains a similar amount of caffeine as a cup of coffee… the thing is, with matcha the caffeine is released into the body over a longer period, so you get the benefit of being alert for an extended period without the shakiness. You experience what’s known as calm alertness – basically, you’ll be ‘on’, but super chill….and that is an a-m-a-zing combo!
Bonus nerd info: The amino acid L-theanine in matcha increases alpha waves in the brain, causing this calm alertness.
Don’t take my word for it…
Don’t believe me when I say matcha helps you stay focused for long? Maybe this will help… Buddhist monks of the 7th century were known to use matcha to help with their concentration during their hours and hours of meditation. I think we can all agree sitting still for hours is no easy feat and your focus haffi up deh! But if you still don’t believe me, let’s look at another example…samurais. They would drink matcha in tea ceremonies as a part of their training to improve their level of concentration and focus as they prepared to fight. Have you ever seen a samurai fight? Tell mi seh dat nuh require some breed of focus! Monks and samurais….I think we can agree that when it comes to focus and concentration, they have their stuff together!
How is this related to discipline?
Focus and discipline go hand-in-hand. You might even say that focus is key to living a life of discipline. Can you imagine going for a professional designation and trying to be disciplined without focus? I didn’t think so.
Our aim in these mini blogs is to highlight the part that matcha plays in establishing discipline in our everyday lives. So we’ve looked at how matcha helps to improve focus and concentration. Next stop: Matcha and stick-to-itiveness.
Matcha love!
