Welcome to CBD With Bre, a blog series where I, as a self-proclaimed CBD noob, recount my experiences getting into the world of CBD. While I have a fair amount of knowledge on the research and science side of things, as I’m learning, it’s quite different when applied off the page.

Finding myself regularly tired, brain-fogged, and unmotivated causes me to waste time I don’t really have. Things take a lot longer to get done and end up being left to last minute. I pay for my lack of focus in deadline anxiety later on. If I could manage to balance that process out a little, my life would be a lot less chaotic. That’s why I wanted to investigate the potential concentration effects of CBD, to see if I was able to have any success with it.

Of course, just as a quick disclaimer, this post is for informational purposes only and not meant to endorse any particular company or product. It’s just here to reflect and discuss my personal experiences in hopes that they provide others with some deeper insight and understanding of CBD.

Context and Background

At the time of writing this, I’m a third year student in university. Disregarding the rest of life’s demands and the impossibility of creating some sort of work/life balance, uni is a ton of work. I have to stay on top of huge amounts of readings, papers, and assignments, which leaves very little time for me to be out of sorts. The worst thing I can do to myself is go through a day, or series of days, where I’m unable to get motivated and focus.

Since this is the case, I’m constantly looking for solutions – often in the form of coffee and energy drinks. However, while temporarily helping me out, I don’t respond well to caffeine. It tends to cause more grogginess problems than it’s worth. CBD might be an alternative route, but will it be enough to support me through boring assignments and the allure of afternoon naps?

The Experiment

Admittedly, CBD for concentration was never something I originally set out to explore. I wanted to see if CBD would have an impact on things like my sleep cycle or hormones, but I didn’t consider it for helping me focus until I started noticing through my own personal use of it that it seemed to have an effect. In trying to explore CBD for sleep, I started taking it somewhat consistently every day around the same time in the evening – around 9pm. This would give it time to settle into my body and give me a few hours to relax before falling asleep. I had found that if I took it too early before bed, I’d tend to get groggier in the mornings, though this seemed to change after I had been taking it for a while.

Although I’m generally someone who focuses better at night, I started to find that after I took CBD in the evenings, my focus would be extra amplified. Generally, I’ll take a bit of CBD, get a whole lot of stuff done in a few hours, and then have a great sleep. I started to wonder if there wasn’t a connection between CBD and my productivity, and decided to focus my attention on documenting the effects I was noticing.

Of course, I’m recounting my own anecdotal experience. There’s been little research conducted into the effects of CBD on focus and concentration, so the science isn’t there yet.

My Observations

As always, I’ll be summarizing my main observations in bullet points below:

• I don’t tend to sleep well, generally. CBD, although not a perfect solution, has made it much easier for me personally to both fall and stay asleep. When I’m better rested, tackling everything from assignments, house cleaning, or research is a lot easier. For more details about my CBD and sleep experiments, check out this post.
• I’ve also found CBD helps with my general anxiety levels. I spend less time worrying about things and more time getting them done. Anxiety makes it hard to focus and prioritize, so minimizing that always helps. I’ve talked more about my experiences with CBD and anxiety here.
• In terms of focus more specifically, CBD does seem to make my mind feel a lot clearer. I also have more motivation to work through boring assignments. When I take it, I find that I have a higher level of concentration that allows me to get done a lot in a shorter amount of time.
• All this said, as I mentioned above, I’ve also been attending therapy, working on better self-care, and doing other things to better handle my anxiety. It’s important to take these factors into account. Although I feel like CBD has had a positive impact, it’s only a small piece of what I’ve been doing. Things like the placebo effect can be powerful, and with what limited science is available now, my observations can’t be taken as any guarantee of outcome either. Everyone responds differently, after all.
• CBD has helped me create a more consistent routine for myself, which is something I really struggle with. I’m not a consistent person, and I know that I suffer for it. However, taking CBD somewhat regularly has gotten me into this routine of de-stress, heightened productivity, and better sleep.
• On the best days, taking CBD gives me the same sort of clarity and focus that caffeine does, minus the crash and next day grogginess. It’s kind of like my thoughts are less chaotic and more streamlined, which also helps me relax and sleep later on. It doesn’t keep me up the same way coffee does.
• It does depend on the day. CBD isn’t a perfect solution. Some days it seems to affect me a lot, while others I still struggle to get homework done. I’m not sure what accounts for these variables yet, but I’m sure things like consistency, what I ate that day, how much work I did, etc. can all have an impact.
• In the end, I can say that CBD is one tool that seems to help me focus, but I wouldn’t rely on it solely. There hasn’t been a lot of research into the focus and concentration effects of CBD either, so any experiences I have are anecdotal and not backed up with the science. Making sure that I’m eating well, getting enough sleep, and taking breaks are all other important things to do as well.

TL;DR

From what I’ve found for myself, CBD has not only helped me get into a better routine in my day-to-day life, but it boosts my productivity, motivation, and focus. By being able to do a concentrated, highly productive few hours of work every day, I’m not only freeing up a bunch of time, but saving myself a lot of stress in the future. While I can’t say that CBD has fixed all the chaos in my life, it’s definitely helping me be a little more balanced. Then again, things like eating right, exercising, and taking breaks are equally, if not more, important to focus on as well.