Creating a Better Life

The Worst Kept Secret of Success

One of worst kept secrets of success is the power of focus.

We live in a society that loves to distract us. You no longer have to wait for a commercial to find out what’s on next on the television - an announcement of the next big show will pop up on the bottom of the screen, complete with animation to be sure that you’ve noticed it. Where I live, it can sometimes be a struggle just to get into the grocery store without someone wanting to talk to you about impeaching one of our political leaders or lending a hand to people who are down and out. With cell phones, PDA’s, instant messaging, and all of the other tools of communication that we’ve come up with, people can interrupt you on a whim.

If you want to be successful, you’ll need to learn to stay focused. It isn’t really very difficult, but you may need to make some changes to your thinking and behavior in order to achieve it. Here are some suggestions:

Learn to Accept Distractions

Not accept as in allow them all in - accept as in “it is what it is.” People are going to distract you, and it just becomes even more of a distraction when it gets under your skin. When you allow your own emotions to become more of a distraction than the 30 second cell phone call, your productivity can take a real hit. When something does show up while you are focused on something else, make the decision immediately to defer it until later or to completely forget about it.

Turn Off Your Phone, Email, and Instant Messaging

Simply because someone wants to communicate with you, you are under no obligation to reciprocate. I’m not talking about complete isolation here, but when you are working on a project that demands your attention, the last thing you need are ringing phones and flashing windows on your computer distracting you. Voicemail works just fine for many communications, and your email isn’t going anywhere (no matter how much you want it to!). Just be sure that you take the time to stay on top of these things, or the tug of “What’s in there now?” can become a distraction in and of itself.

Stop Multitasking

If you consider the millions of pieces of information that are flowing into our minds every day, and the fact that our conscious minds are only able to focus on one thing at a time, it’s pretty amazing that we are able to focus on anything at all.

Our conscious minds can only focus on one thing at a time. It may seem like some people can do multiple tasks at once, but what they are really doing is one of two things - they are either “fast-switching” between tasks, which gives the appearance doing more than one thing at a time, or they are using the power of habit with one of the tasks, and therefore not consciously focusing on it at all.

If you think about a computer, it can sometimes seems like your PC can do multiple things at once (playing an MP3, displaying a Word document, receiving an email)… but unless it has more than one processing chip (the computer’s brain), it really isn’t - it’s just switching back and forth between doing one thing at a time rapidly.

It’s the same with us. Our conscious minds can only do one thing at a time, and every time you try to focus on more than that one thing, you lose a little bit of your power of focus. Decide what you want to be focused upon, and do only that.

Use Specific Times for Planning and Reflection

One of the things that has helped me immensely when my own brain gets “scattered and splattered” is pausing for a moment and saying to myself “Where am I Now? What am I working on Now?” Many times, my brain has veered off into the realm of the past (regret about what happened yesterday), or the future (worry about what might happen tomorrow.) Those two little bugaboos can kill your today. There’s productive reflection and goal setting, and then there’s regret and worry. Make your reflection and planning distinct activities, and you’ll know that when they pop up in the middle of preparing that report for work, you can remind yourself that now is not the time.

Live in Day Tight Compartments

This one comes from a couple of different sources, and is related to the previous suggestion. One of the first things people recovering from addictions are taught is the benefit of living “One Day At A Time.” The “Living in Day Tight Compartments” wording comes from “How to Stop Worrying and Start Living” by Dale Carnegie.

While the ideal is to live Right Now, as human beings the current Right Now is flowing into the next Right Now, and the next Right Now, and the next Right Now. The Now is not something you can hold on to. When you decide to live in day tight compartments, it goes a long way toward eliminating much of those distractions that can pop up in your own head that were mentioned earlier.

Keep a List

Do your best to always have an easy way of recording your thoughts as they pop into your head. When I’m working at the computer, my personal favorite is Google Desktop’s Scratch Pad Gadget, while away from it a small notebook and a pen and paper do a great job. While you are doing what you are doing Now, and things pop into your head, jot them down. This has the benefit of telling your brain “I’ve got it, you don’t have to worry about this right now.” Then, get back to what you are working on.

Practice Focusing

One of the biggest benefits I’ve experienced since I started meditating is an increased ability to focus. Fifteen minutes of meditation seems to add two hours to my day, which isn’t a bad return on investment. Those extra hours come from the increase in focus that meditation gives me. Learning to watch your own breath, and the practice of gently bringing your mind back to that breath when it wanders, does wonders for your ability to concentrate the rest of the day.

What do you do that helps you to focus? I’d love to hear your own suggestions. Be sure to leave them in the comments section so that all of us can benefit.

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What Would You Do With An Extra 36 Hours?

About a week ago, Edward Mills of Evolving Times asked his readers and fellow bloggers what they would do with an extra 36 hours a week?

Edward came up with the question based on the blogtastic book The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss. I haven’t read the book yet, but I call it blogtastic because of the way that it took the blogosphere by storm and fundamentally changed the way that many of us go about their daily tasks. I credit Andy Wibbels’ interview with Tim when the book first came out with my attitude of “Just because it comes in electronically doesn’t mean I have to respond right now”, which has provided both a major boost to my own productivity, as well as an ability to really focus on the people that I respond to with the thoughtfulness that they deserve.

To tell the truth I really don’t want to add yet another book to my ever growing reading list at the moment. But from what I’ve gleaned from all of the information about it, both on Ferriss’ web site and from all of the blogs that have written about it, the book is about achieving one basic thing: time freedom.

For the sake of this article, I’m going to take the idea at face value. If I only had to spend four hours a week at my day job, how would I spend the other 36?

I’d Write More

This one was a no brainer… but maybe “more” doesn’t really cover it. I’d also write different stuff, on other topics that I enjoy and in other forms. Most of my writing takes the form of personal development blogging nowadays, and I’d like to branch out.

I’d Spend More Quality Time With My Wife

Another no brainer. But the important word here is quality. Not just being under the same roof while I write and blog and build and she does her thing, but doing things together, both in the house (woo-hoo!) and outside.

I’d Improve My Web Development Skills

While I’m no slouch at the basics of application development, I’d really like to take the time to refine my PHP, MySQL, and Javascript skills to the point where every time I wanted to do something a little different, I didn’t have to search Google for someone else’s code to learn from. It’s great to learn by example, but if I could really take the time to learn a language’s syntax and concepts, I know that it would cut much of the time I spend developing in half.

I’d Visit My Family More

My mom, brother, soon to be sister-in-law, and step-dad are all on the east coast, and I’m on the west. It’s been way too long since I’ve been out there. Way way way too long…

I’d Get Involved in Local Groups That Promote Self Improvement and Personal Growth

One of the thing that I love about the web is the time shifting - I can participate in a discussion on a forum or blog without it having to be done at any set time. But I’d like to get involved in local groups again (like a Religious Science church, or maybe Toastmasters) where I can meet with like minded people. My current job, because of it’s shifting schedule, doesn’t allow me to do that with any consistency.

Hmmm… after writing out that list, maybe I do want to pick up a copy of the book!

Thanks for including me in this, Edward!

And now, what would you do if you had that extra 36 hours? Feel free to leave your ideas in the comments below. If you’ve got a blog, write up a post and link it back to the original post on Evolving Times, so that Ed can include your article when he compiles his list of participants.

This Moment is the First Moment of the Rest of Your Life

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When I was growing up, my parents had a cross-stitch on the wall that read:

“Today is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life”

I don’t know who originally said it, but it’s so simple and so full of truth it still fascinates me.

I like to break it down even further:

“This Moment is the First Moment of the Rest of Your Life”

It doesn’t matter what happened before… start right now.

Of course, you’ll have to deal with the conditions you created up to this point. But that’s all they are: conditions. What is within you is more powerful than conditions.

Never mind what you want to do with your life. What do you want to do with this moment?

One of my favorite quotes from the movie “The Secret” comes from James Ray:

“Most people look at their current state of affairs and say ‘This is who I am.’ That’s not who you are… that’s who you were.”

It can be who you are… as a matter of fact, that’s the easiest thing in the world to be: exactly who you’ve been up until now.

The problem is… you actually can’t be. You are always changing, whether you like it or not. If we don’t consciously direct that change, most of the time the change won’t be for the better.

What do you want to do with this moment?