Difficulty focusing on studying

docrice · August 2010

Am I the only one who has a hard time concentrating and learning some of this material? I've taken a prep course for this already, I have a couple of books, plus I have the Shon Harris DVDs. Thankfully, while the two longest domains (at least on the DVDs) - cryptography and telecommunications - were familiar territory for me, some other areas feel really dry and I'm having a hard time keeping my mind focused on them.

Maybe I'm too used to the technical "this is the button to push" type exams. Don't get me wrong, the domains in the CISSP are important, but when it feels too high-level and not enough meat, I get bored. Part of me wants to understand a lot of this basic foundational material, but another side of me just wants to get to the good stuff ... which isn't in the CISSP. It's kind of like when I was going over the "System Development Life Cycle" section in the CCNA Security - I started rolling my eyes.

powerfool · August 2010

You definitely are not the only one. I used to be really good about focusing on my studies. I could pick up a technical certification study guide in the range of 800-1200 pages and read it in one weekend. Now, I am lucky to get through one chapter without starting to doze off. My saving grace has been that I just have so much more experience now that the studying is just a quick review.

When I studied for my CISSP earlier this year I had planned on a boot camp and I wanted to knock out reading the Shon Harris All-in-One before I went to it. I only ended up getting through the first two domains. I had a hard time sitting through the boot camp too, and I skipped the networking and telecom day to catch up on sleep.

I think that the key is getting good rest and finding the keys points to study. I am not sure of your level of experience, but I am to the point where a good chunk of my studies include a lot of material that I have exhausted. Look at the areas you need to cover and focus on that.

Lastly, find your motivation and keep it in your vision as often as possible. Is it higher salary? What will you do with the money? Will you take a vacation that you want? Put a picture of the place on your bathroom mirror or something. Do what you can to keep your eye on the prize.

Best wishes with your studies.

Bl8ckr0uter · August 2010

I understand completely. I'm working my way through the network security bible. The policy and procedures chapters have me snoring.

shaqazoolu · August 2010

It's not CISSP but I am currently studying for the SSCP next month. It is mind-numbing material for sure. The last few weekends I would get through a little bit and end up falling asleep during the day. 10pm rolls around and I read this stupid book non stop until about 3am and absorb it. Today the exact opposite happens...I get through about 30 pages in a hurry during the day, take a break and night time rolls around and my brain is thinking about pretty much everything except the book in front of me. It's pretty annoying.

My motivation is the stuff I get to start working on after this. A possible bump in pay when review time comes around in January is also a plus.

Turgon · August 2010

docrice wrote: »

Am I the only one who has a hard time concentrating and learning some of this material? I've taken a prep course for this already, I have a couple of books, plus I have the Shon Harris DVDs. Thankfully, while the two longest domains (at least on the DVDs) - cryptography and telecommunications - were familiar territory for me, some other areas feel really dry and I'm having a hard time keeping my mind focused on them.

Maybe I'm too used to the technical "this is the button to push" type exams. Don't get me wrong, the domains in the CISSP are important, but when it feels too high-level and not enough meat, I get bored. Part of me wants to understand a lot of this basic foundational material, but another side of me just wants to get to the good stuff ... which isn't in the CISSP. It's kind of like when I was going over the "System Development Life Cycle" section in the CCNA Security - I started rolling my eyes.

Hang in there. Once you progress higher up the food chain in terms of jobs and responsibilities the high level view comes more into play. I have worked with network designers who cant configure a trunk properly, but so long as they are aware it's needed they can get away with specifying it as a requirement and letting the underpaid implemention engineers take care of the configuration details! Get used to high level awareness type studies if you want to get on, but an eye for detail is also good!

hustlin_moe20 · August 2010

docrice wrote: »

Am I the only one who has a hard time concentrating and learning some of this material? I've taken a prep course for this already, I have a couple of books, plus I have the Shon Harris DVDs. Thankfully, while the two longest domains (at least on the DVDs) - cryptography and telecommunications - were familiar territory for me, some other areas feel really dry and I'm having a hard time keeping my mind focused on them.

Maybe I'm too used to the technical "this is the button to push" type exams. Don't get me wrong, the domains in the CISSP are important, but when it feels too high-level and not enough meat, I get bored. Part of me wants to understand a lot of this basic foundational material, but another side of me just wants to get to the good stuff ... which isn't in the CISSP. It's kind of like when I was going over the "System Development Life Cycle" section in the CCNA Security - I started rolling my eyes.

Nope, I'm in the boat with you. I figured I'd give myself plenty of time to study for the exam which is in November. I'm also in Afghanistan so I thought I'd need more time. I need less time really. Knowing I have so much time has killed my focus. I'm on the Telecom domain now and have been stalled out for 3-4 days lol. I know it's there but I don't even look at it. The SH AIO 5th and her videos all kill me. I ordered CISSP for dummies 3rd edition 2 days ago to get a break from Shon. This stuff is super dry and boring as can be. The crypto domain was my weak point so I stuck with it even though it was long.

Maybe my dummies book will help. I'm trying not to take a boot camp costing 2k or more if I can do this on my own.

docrice · August 2010

I've learned over the years that I just simply don't learn that efficiently when there's no motivation behind it. Some days it's there, some days it's not. After going through the Shon Harris videos once (34 hours worth), I decided I needed a break and do something less mundane-ish.

Right now I'm going through the OSWP course which is relatively short and sweet (since much of the theory is review for me). At least with this I get excited, unlike the CISSP where many times I'm sitting there thinking, "Someone please open a command prompt already!"

For someone like me, maybe it just requires enough time and patience to muddle through it so it sticks. Don't get me wrong though - to a certain point I love the material. I'd rather be studying Business Continuity rather than doing SQL queries in Oracle. Right now the potential future pay raise and better high-level awareness of infosec is the only thing pushing me. In the short term, it's not always sufficient.

Difficulty focusing on studying

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