The Incredible Power Of Focus!

The Incredible Power Of Focus!

Focus is so powerful it can be used to cut steel.

With a power as low as 800 Watts, hardly enough to heat the average room, a light source can be focused to form an intense pinpoint of energy less that 1mm in diameter which contains enough energy to cut through sheet steel with high accuracy. This is a wonderful testimony for the power of focus. Scattered energy produces little, if no result, whereas very carefully focused energy will produce amazing results!

What is Focus?

Dictionary.com defines Focus as a noun describing "a central point, as of attraction, attention, or activity."

Wikipedia defines Focus as related to psychotherapy and related disciples as follows; the term focusing is used to refer to the simple matter of holding a kind of open, non-judging attention to something which is directly experienced but is not yet in words. 

Focusing can be used to become clear on what one feels or wants. 

Focusing is set apart from other methods of inner awareness by three qualities: something called the "felt sense", a quality of engaged accepting attention, and a philosophy of what facilitates change.

Focus determines our future.

Tony Robbins can be quoted: 

"What you focus on consistently, you tend to manifest in your life"

Chris Howard can be quoted: 

"Where attention goes, energy flows and results show"

Focus starts in our mind then shows in our behaviour. 

Focus is not only in our mind it is in our actions. Our mind creates the actions that we use to produce our future.

Our brain processes massive amounts of information every moment

Our brain takes in around 2 million sensory inputs in every second in the form of sights, sounds, touch, tastes and smells, of course that is not our experience though, this is because we cannot process that much information, so our brain uses filters to delete, distort or generalise the sensory input into about 7 internal representations, or "chunks" that our brain can find useful. 

To reflect this in Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) terms "The Map is not the Territory", in other words what we see is not a complete representation of of what is going on around us. That raises the question; What are we missing? Could it be the next amazing opportunity? Could it be a danger approaching? Could it be how blessed we already are? Could it be the Acres of Diamonds that we have right beneath us?

You get what you focus on.

As more eloquently stated by Tony Robbins and Chris Howard in the above quotes, you get what you focus on. Why? Because we have conditioned our brain to delete, distort and generalize.

Imagine are in a dark room with a torch and need to exit the room quickly. If you have been taught to shine the torch at the floor when you use a torch, all you will see is the floor ahead of you, as you walk forward you soon bump into a wall and have no way out. If you have been taught to rapidly wave the torch up and down and around about in random movements you may see lots of the room, but still may miss finding the door and the window that you could use to exit. Both these example are extremes, yet are more common than you think. How often have you met somebody who proudly states "we have always done it this way"? Or somebody who jumps from one great idea to the next every day? How many of you have seen this behaviour in your own life? I know it has held me back a lot in the past!

Where you shine the "Flashlight of your focus" determines what you "see". We will deal more with the science behind our thoughts and behaviours at another time, for now let's just think about 2 key points:

• If you try to focus everywhere, you scatter your energy and potentially miss the true best opportunity for you.
• If you stay focused on the wrong thing you will get the wrong results. (it has been said that it is crazy to think that you can keep doing the same think and get different results)

Let's turn the above points around:

• If you place your focus in the right place you will concentrate your energy and create the results you desire!

Focus as it relates to our mind.

It is vital to create the correct focus in our mind. For example: If you focus on poverty and you with tend to manifest poverty, focus on Prosperity and you will tend to manifest Prosperity. If you focus on sickness or disease you will tend to manifest sickness or disease, focus on Health you will tend to manifest Health. If you focus hatred you will tend to manifest hatred, focus on Love you will tend to manifest Love. If you focus on boredom you will tend to manifest boredom, if you focus on Fun you will tend to Manifest Fun. What do you focus on most of the time?

In order to create the focus of our thoughts here are some things that will assist:

• Be Aware: Now that you know the effect of focus, watch yourself and your results, see the effect that focus has on your life.
• Be Grateful: Regularly (once a day or more) take account of all the things you are grateful for. If you are having a challenging day and nothing seems to be worth being grateful, push through the mental barriers and ask "If there was something to be grateful for, what would it be". This shifts your mind into a state of looking for the best.
• Know your outcome: Steven Covey states "Begin with the end in mind". Take some time to think about what you would like to achieve from life. Break this down into measurable goals that you can use to align your focus with. (We will cover much more on goals in later articles)

• Acknowledge Everything: It is important to acknowledge everything that is happening or has happened in the past. All these things effect the "filters" our brain uses to delete, distort or generalize. If your car had faulty brakes and you failed to acknowledge it then it would not matter how much you focused on stopping, it would not stop. There is a lot of theory about the conscious and sub-conscious mind that could be discussed around this topic, however for now, let's just trust and use this simple process:
  • Acknowledge all that is so
  • Make it OK (this may include acceptance of the issue and forgiving yourself and/or others)
  • Choose how you would like it to be. This determines your future focus.
• Condition our mind for the outcome we desire: This topic deserves much more attention than this article has space for and will be dealt with in more detail later. Here are some brief suggestions:
  • Write your goals down,
  • Read your goals regularly remind yourself of these goals
  • Use techniques such as "the magnetic goal drop" to place the goal into your sub-conscious mind
  • Use affirmations to remind yourself of the behaviours you need
  • Take time to pray and meditate on your desired outcome

Focus as it relates to our use of time.

Time is said to be the "one true equaliser of all people", we all have 24 hrs in a day, 365 days in a year, no other thing brings the same equality as time. In effect we choose our use of time from our mind, however it is useful to look at this separately and address some of the external conditions we need to create in order to allow us to focus:

• Set aside time each day where you can be undisturbed to "clear your mind of the clutter" and make the space to focusing your mind. Catherine Ponder teaches about the "Prosperity law of Vacuum", in summary; In order for us to place something into our life, we must first have the space vacant for it to fill. Undisturbed time may require the following:
  • Turn off the phone
  • Turn off the email
  • Turn off instant messaging
  • Lock your office door or escape to a quite location
  • Let others know you are not available at that time
• Set side time for certain tasks. This is especially important if they are things you have been procrastinating on, set aside the time and get them done! This is also important for keep yourself up to date with important jobs. For more information on this I highly recommend reading Stephen R Covey's First Things First.
• Count the cost before you commit. Remember the torch example, if we are scattered in our focus our results will be limited and we may miss important opportunities. Being 'spread too thin' does not allow anyone to operate at their optimum. Always ask yourself "how important is this task to achieving my goals".
• Focus on one thing at a time. It is know to usually be more effective to take one project to completion before starting the next than to have multiple projects on the go at the same time. Jim Collins refers to the Hedgehog Concept to describe how focused people can achieve greater results than others. The Hedgehog concept compares two animals; a fox, which is very clever and knows many creative ways to get a meal, and the hedgehog, a somewhat dull animal that knows one, and only one, thing. To roll into a spiked ball for protection. The hedgehog always wins, because despite the fox's many clever tricks and high intelligence, there's no getting around a spiky ball. This highlights how one good solid strategy can be more powerful than many "clever" strategies. 
• Focus: Follow One Course Until Successful
• Focus Now! You are not truly focused unless you are present. You mind and body must be aligned, alert and thinking about what you are doing right now, not what happened yesterday, not what you are going to do next, but what you are FOCUSING on RIGHT NOW!

In Summary.

Your brain and its relationship to the world around us is setup in such a way that how you focus your mind and energy determines the results you achieve. 

We need to focus our attention on the things we desire to achieve and maintain that focus. 

The better we can focus on the correct things the more we will achieve. 

In order to focus we need to condition our mind and manage our time.

Action Steps.

1. Consider one goal that is achievable for you in the near future and write it down.
2. Consider all the things you have been blessed with that will form the foundation for achieving this goal and write those down.
3. Determine a time and space that you can use to working on these goals and commit to that time.
4. Focus your mind on that goal by reading and affirming it regularly.
5. Work on that goal consistently until you achieve it.

Transform your life now! 

Set a Goal, give it some Focus and achieve your Desires!

By: Anthony Tawse: source