How To Focus - The Three Step Strategy
At its most basic, focus is about paying attention or being fully aware of what you're doing now. Watch top sports people in action - you'll notice, before your very eyes on television, the methods, routines and rituals that they use to ensure that they are completely engrossed in what they're doing just at that moment in time. But they're doing it in a particular context - you only see the tip of the iceberg because highly successful people are focused on a number of different levels. In other words, their present focus has been directed by, perhaps, a whole career's focus based on what they want out of life. In other words, whilst people like Ekhart Tolle - in his books which extol the virtues of 'The Power of Now' - talk about focus as something that you must do right here, right now, there's a little more to focus than meets the television viewer's eye.
Like onions, focus has layers! Through my work with my clients on my personal development workshops, I have come to the conclusion that there are three levels or layers to becoming truly focused - and three steps that you must take to enable you learn how to focus and direct that focus in a productive way.
Strategic Focus
Simply focusing on the present moment is highly rewarding - research confirms that those who know how to do it are effective and productive and, as a result, happy and content. But, whilst only focusing on the present moment produces those kinds of results, a life of focusing on now can lead to an existence of aimless bliss. I've no problem with bliss - it needs to become and integral part of everybody's daily life. But I do have a problem with the aimless bit. If you're like me, you've got to put bread on the table each and every evening - in other words, your focus must be practical. If you're like me, you've other people depending on you to be practical - so some altered state of mind bliss is simply not on.
The point I'm making is that here and now focus - which I'll deal with later on in this article - needs direction. You'll find that this direction is often refered to as goal-setting. However, the problem with goals is that they might just result in your living a life of perpetual dissatisfied expectation. Of course, that presupposes that you've actually established the correct goals! As normal people, we've little or no perspective on what is best for us, so it's best not to cast your goals in stone. Give some expectation the power to make you happy and, by definition, if you don't get it you'll be unhappy! So you need to focus your mind on what it would be like to have arrived - what it would look like, feel like and sound like to be on the right life path - whatever your very own personal 'right path' might be.
In other words, your strategic focus should be touchy-feely - captivating your subconscious mind with an excitement that drives you to be more and more focused on a daily basis or, ultimately, on a moment to moment basis. You should write those touchy-feely outcomes down on a regular basis. They should be handwritten - because, when you write by hand, you engross and, as a result, motivate your subconscious mind. This is how you should set your strategic focus.
Operational Focus
Once your subconscious mind knows the direction you're headed, you need to get your head around the important things that you need to do today. There's a world of difference between important and urgent - and, all too often, we find ourselves being overwhelmed by the urgent to the extent that we're left with no time to do the important. Or, worse again, we waste our energy - reading emails that nobody was meant to read, gossiping with others about bad news, channel-hopping, talking nonsense on Facebook - just think about it, we are all experts at finding stuff to do that gets in the way of us getting the life that we want.
Operational focus means that you know the difference between doing the right thing and wasting your time and energy. You'll only realize whether or not you're doing the right thing if you stop yourself at various points during the day and ask yourself the question: "Am I doing the right thing?" If you are cool! If you're not, stop it and start doing the right thing!
Task-Based Focus
Once you're doing the right thing, you need to do it right! All too often, when we set about doing the right thing, we get easily knocked off course - by distraction, by others wanting to waste our time, by taking on other people's problems, by not saying 'no'. Task-based focus is all about fully immersing yourself in whatever it is you're doing. Unfortunately, for the normal mind, this is not something that comes naturally. In fact, it seems to only happen by accident on the very odd occasion that you find time flying because you're actually having fun. You must discover how to focus your mind from one moment to the very next.
Meditation is the very best was to learn how to invest all of your attention in the here and now. Your undisciplined mind needs discipline - when you meditate you give it what it needs. When you meditate, you engross yourself in what some or all of your five senses are telling you - in effect, you discover how easy it is to simply turn off distraction and become exceptionally focused. In other words, the right thing to be doing every morning - the very best way to start the day and ensure that you're pointed in the right direction - is to meditate.
Copyright (c) 2011 Willie Horton
Like onions, focus has layers! Through my work with my clients on my personal development workshops, I have come to the conclusion that there are three levels or layers to becoming truly focused - and three steps that you must take to enable you learn how to focus and direct that focus in a productive way.
Strategic Focus
Simply focusing on the present moment is highly rewarding - research confirms that those who know how to do it are effective and productive and, as a result, happy and content. But, whilst only focusing on the present moment produces those kinds of results, a life of focusing on now can lead to an existence of aimless bliss. I've no problem with bliss - it needs to become and integral part of everybody's daily life. But I do have a problem with the aimless bit. If you're like me, you've got to put bread on the table each and every evening - in other words, your focus must be practical. If you're like me, you've other people depending on you to be practical - so some altered state of mind bliss is simply not on.
The point I'm making is that here and now focus - which I'll deal with later on in this article - needs direction. You'll find that this direction is often refered to as goal-setting. However, the problem with goals is that they might just result in your living a life of perpetual dissatisfied expectation. Of course, that presupposes that you've actually established the correct goals! As normal people, we've little or no perspective on what is best for us, so it's best not to cast your goals in stone. Give some expectation the power to make you happy and, by definition, if you don't get it you'll be unhappy! So you need to focus your mind on what it would be like to have arrived - what it would look like, feel like and sound like to be on the right life path - whatever your very own personal 'right path' might be.
In other words, your strategic focus should be touchy-feely - captivating your subconscious mind with an excitement that drives you to be more and more focused on a daily basis or, ultimately, on a moment to moment basis. You should write those touchy-feely outcomes down on a regular basis. They should be handwritten - because, when you write by hand, you engross and, as a result, motivate your subconscious mind. This is how you should set your strategic focus.
Operational Focus
Once your subconscious mind knows the direction you're headed, you need to get your head around the important things that you need to do today. There's a world of difference between important and urgent - and, all too often, we find ourselves being overwhelmed by the urgent to the extent that we're left with no time to do the important. Or, worse again, we waste our energy - reading emails that nobody was meant to read, gossiping with others about bad news, channel-hopping, talking nonsense on Facebook - just think about it, we are all experts at finding stuff to do that gets in the way of us getting the life that we want.
Operational focus means that you know the difference between doing the right thing and wasting your time and energy. You'll only realize whether or not you're doing the right thing if you stop yourself at various points during the day and ask yourself the question: "Am I doing the right thing?" If you are cool! If you're not, stop it and start doing the right thing!
Task-Based Focus
Once you're doing the right thing, you need to do it right! All too often, when we set about doing the right thing, we get easily knocked off course - by distraction, by others wanting to waste our time, by taking on other people's problems, by not saying 'no'. Task-based focus is all about fully immersing yourself in whatever it is you're doing. Unfortunately, for the normal mind, this is not something that comes naturally. In fact, it seems to only happen by accident on the very odd occasion that you find time flying because you're actually having fun. You must discover how to focus your mind from one moment to the very next.
Meditation is the very best was to learn how to invest all of your attention in the here and now. Your undisciplined mind needs discipline - when you meditate you give it what it needs. When you meditate, you engross yourself in what some or all of your five senses are telling you - in effect, you discover how easy it is to simply turn off distraction and become exceptionally focused. In other words, the right thing to be doing every morning - the very best way to start the day and ensure that you're pointed in the right direction - is to meditate.
Copyright (c) 2011 Willie Horton
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