How to Master Your Attention

The simple act of completing everything you start will help you strengthen your concentration muscles and master your attention.  This seems like a simple idea and it is. You master your attention by mastering your completions.

I spoke to a woman earlier this week that is a friend of mine.  I sensed that she seemed a little confused and frustrated.  As we got talking she told me about the different businesses she works in.  I asked her, “how many business do you have?” and she replied, “I have three.”

If you ask me, that’s two, too many and here’s why.  Having too many businesses scatters your focus.

Let me explain.

Let’s think of those businesses, sort of like driving a car, but not just one car – many cars.  Let’s also say you have five different cars and you want to drive all of them at the same time.

You get into the first car and you drive it 300 feet.  Since you can only drive one car at a time you stop that car and walk all the way back to the second car.

Now you take the second car and drive it 400 feet.  Again, you stop that car and walk back to drive the third car.

You drive the third car 700 feet.  You’re really satisfied with yourself, but you have to get out of that car and drive the fourth car.

You take the fourth car 150 feet.  You had a terrible day.  You hum and haw over your losses and walk all the way back to the stop light and get into your fifth car.

You drive the fifth car about 600 feet.  You’re really cruising but you have to stop again and go all the way back to the first car again.

Can you see the problem here?

Since you can only drive one car at one time you scatter your focus.  Your energy and actions become dispersed making it almost impossible to progress and move forward.  Why?

You’re driving too many cars!

What’s the alternative?

Master your attention.  Become absolutely focused.  Choose one business to focus on at one time.  Don’t shift your attention to other businesses.  Stay focused on only one business until you’ve got it running on autopilot or at least until you have someone else running it.  Get it to completion.

But it doesn’t stop there.

This applies to other areas of your life as well.  Maybe you have a list of projects that are important to you; it could be anything from home improvements to personal health.  You find it difficult to get things done and you can’t seem to figure out why.

Where’s the first place to look?

See how many cars you’re driving.

You might have five different cars and you want to drive all of them at the same time.  What should you do?

Choose one car.  Drive that one car until you’re done with it or at least happy with your results.  Wash and repeat.

Do this over and over again, driving one car at a time.  It’s simple isn’t it?  Then go ahead and get started.  Choose one task to complete today and then go out and do it using effective action and the 80/20 rule.

The more you do this, the more effective you become – you become a master of your attention.  Not only that, but some other side effects may include:

• joy, bliss and happiness more of the time
• a sense of pride in your work
• feeling satisfied and accomplished
• feeling more connected and energetic

…what are you putting off that you could complete right now?