What do you Focus on?

When I bought my first car in Perth, Western Australia in the summer of 1999 ( a lovely navy blue Ford Laser, 1982 model), I took it for a spin to Scarborough Beach. This car was brand new to me. I had never owned a car in my life, so I was pretty excited. It did not have air con so I unwound the windows and cranked up the music.

Then something weird happened. I saw someone driving the exact same type and age of car as my car. Then another one, then another one. On an 20 kilometer drive I saw a total of seven cars, just like mine, but not quite mine. I was tuned in to the Ford Laser 1982 channel, and that is why I saw so many of them.

What channel is your mind tuned in to? What is the primary thought running through your mind? What channel is influencing you in ways that you cannot even begin to imagine?

We never really step back and analyze our thought patterns. But they are critical to success and happiness. Whatever you think about, you become. So please pay special attention to today’s blog post.

To succeed in any sphere of life, you have to believe that, yes you can. Then eliminate the fear of failure and focus on the eminent achievement of that goal.

I have met many people who will focus on what ails the economy. Or why so and so will not succeed.

In most cases these are very fascinating people to listen to. They are highly intelligent and very analytical. They will dissect an issue and poke holes on water tight dreams. But how far do they go in life? As you can imagine, not very far.

It matters whether you focus on the glass being half full or half empty. If you think that nature conspired with your enemies to deal you a harsh hand, then that is what you will get.

My friend, take control of your life by taming your thoughts. Guide your thoughts to the realm of positivity and infinite possibilities. You can do that by harnessing the power of focus.

How do you improve your focus?

1. Understand your current focus.

2. Set yourself focused goals.

3. Control your thoughts.

4. Learn from failure but don’t dwell on it.

5. Eliminate distractions.

1. Understand your current focus.

What are your current dominating thoughts? Are you a positive person or is your mind clouded in negative thoughts? Take out a piece of paper and write down what you think about mainly. Do you have thoughts that hinder your success? Do you focus on the good in people or the shortcomings of others?

Be very honest with yourself here. Understand what kind of thoughts dictate your life. Then purpose it in your mind to change the self limiting thoughts. Eliminate thoughts that don’t take you towards success.

2. Set yourself focused goals.

Set challenging, yet achievable goals. Make sure your goals have an attainable path of getting there. The kind of goals you set for yourself will determine if you focus long enough to achieve them or be sidetracked.

Create an action plan for getting to your goals. For example if you want to get a new job, set out exactly how you are going to go through the job application process. How many employment agencies do you aim to register with? How many jobs do you want to apply? What kind of positions will you be on the lookout for?

3. Control your thoughts.

You need to put your thoughts on a leash. Don’t let them wander too far from where you want them to be. You can do this by constant affirmations and reminding yourself what it is that you want to achieve. If you let your thoughts wander too far from your control, you will miss the bus. The bus that leads to success. This is one area of life where you are allowed to be a dictator. Dictate your thoughts.

4. Learn from failure but don’t dwell on it.

One of the reasons people don’t take action towards success is due to the of fear of failure. If you focus on the possibility of failure, you lose the momentum of moving forward towards your goals.

Regard failure as your friend. Learn from it and move on. Don’t dwell on your failures and mistakes. Instead focus on your goals and future success.

5. Eliminate distractions.

Distractions come in many forms. You may be distracted from your goals by other people, or even “better” goals. Don’t give in to distractions.

How do you effectively eliminate distractions? Say for example you are a student and you have a term paper coming up. Your friends may want you to join them for social events that would distract you. All you have to do is politely decline and lock yourself in your room and study.

But how about when you have internal demons distracting you? This one is trickier but can be done with practice. Writing down your goals and giving yourself size-able chunks of time to concentrate really helps.

Do not be tempted to multi task. Leave that for machines and super women. I find that multitasking only chews up time when you are switching from one task to another. Give yourself extended periods of concentration for one task, and see it to completion before taking on another.

Summary

What you focus on determines your reality. Choose carefully what you think about. To be able to reach your goals and succeed in life, you muct focus intensely at the task at hand. Do not be afraid of failure, and when you fail, learn from it and move on. Eliminate both internal and external distractions.

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P.s. The irony of it all is that when I started writing this article, ideas for future articles started to pour like there is no tomorrow. I took out an A4 paper and filled it on both sides with blog article ideas. Talk about lack of focus and distractions. This happens all the time! damn.

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