A Focused Mind

Focus has become a key word in our everyday lives and is touched upon in almost every management discussion! However, how many of us are actually able to put this powerful tool into actual practice? Does your Boss asks you to focus to get the job done ASAP? Do you struggle to focus on your new project? Are you able to focus on your presentation for tomorrow? Are you able to focus on your preparation for your interview?

If the answer is NO, then you are loosing precious time and as a result ending up exhausted or shall we say stressed. In a normal day there are a number of tasks we have to accomplish within stringent timelines but the distractions are far too many. Completing a 20 minutes report, sometimes takes a whole day! Reading a 15 minutes lesson, sometimes takes half a day! Writing a 30 minutes article, sometimes takes an eternity! These are just a few examples from our daily lives but if you retrospect, there would be many more.

So, why do we loose focus? Well, the reasons are many but for the sake of comprehension, lets divide them into two. The first challenge is to stay away from distractions that surround our lives; it could be a telephone call, a small gossip, fight with your wife, your loan repayment, your girlfriend, your Boss, etc. The second challenge are controlling the thoughts of our mind. The mind has a peculiar habit to jump from one place to another; at this moment you are perhaps sitting at home reading this article but suddenly in a flip of a second you realize that you have reached a beach resort in Hawaii, in your thoughts!

So what does one do? Actually, the solution for all the problems has a simple answer > train your mind to focus. When you train your mind, then not only you crush the infinite distractions but also remain in better control of complex situations. Now the next question you may want to ask is how to train your mind. Again its pretty simple, practice consistently to “live in the moment” and focus your energies on the present task. Further, one can achieve the art of living in the moment by meditating every day for a few minutes. Some people imagine meditation is about sitting quietly in one place but on the contrary, its simply about being a “witness” to the moment. By meditating everyday, a very powerful thing will happen to you! You would not only be in a position to channelize all your energies into your current goal but will also gain control on the constant chattering of your thoughts. Eventually, you will be able to enhance your productivity and become a envious master of a calm mind.

Improve time management through a focused mind!

One Point Attention

Do you always accomplish all the tasks you set out to accomplish? Do you always struggle to complete to-do lists? Do you always roll over tasks same tasks to the next day? Is multi-tasking taking a toll on you? Do you want to improve our productivity? Is there a better way? 

Perhaps! Lets analyze a routine day in our lives. You start your day in office with the normal lists of things going in your mind. You have your hot cup of coffee and start going though your to-do lists. Since normally mornings are the most quietest of hours, you decide to start with the article you need to submit in the in house news magazine. You barely mange to write one line, when a mail pops-up and you immediately shift focus to responding to the mail and while you are at it, you decide to clear you mail box completely. By the time you finish with your mailbox, it’s 1200 hrs and time for another cup of hot brew. Your mobile is ringing all this while and you are busy resolving critical issues in your job. Your boss calls you for a meeting and gives you certain action items to be accomplished before the end of the day. You drop everything and deliver on Boss’s stuff first. By the time you complete, its time for your team meeting. Lots happening and you are constantly multi-tasking between your phones, mails, meetings and other important stuff. The article you started first thing in the morning has been visited at least 20 times in the day but you have managed to only get half way through. Its now 2000 hrs and your wife is already upset as you have made coming home late a habit. So you decide to wind up for the day and save the pending article. You add it in your to-do list for the next day and make it top priority!

Don’t you feel that that is a typical day in most of our lives? We set out to do a list of things but at the end of the day we realize that have not even completed half of it. We simply end up using our time in the addressing fire items and the creative work (like articles) becomes always the most difficult to accomplish. The result is more worries, which lead to higher stress and ultimately depression. What could you have done better?

Our mind has a limitation! Contrary to many theories, it has the ability to focus only at one thing at a time. If you observe carefully and give a single pointed attention to a particular task at hand, then that task may get completed in 1/4th the time or even less. This happens because every time we switch our mind, we again have to re-process information from scratch. We can argue that this is hardly noticeable as it may take just a few seconds but doesn’t every drop fills an ocean. If we accumulate all these drops or focus our energies into one task at a time then not only we will accomplish more but also remain in control with a stable mind.

One point attention not only has the ability to prevent stress but also increases the strength of our mind. Its understandable to switch between mundane tasks which are embedded in your sub-conscious but to enhance effectiveness, we need to have a one point attention towards at least the creative or shall we say conscious tasks.

Practice One Point Attention to enhance your Productivity!