Lack of focus

Welcome to my very first blog! I hope that we could both learn a few new things as we go along on this journey of life. Over the past few weeks I have been pondering on the lack of courtesy in our society. Every morning in traffic on my way to the office I see road rage and very little tolerance.

Looking at the different people travelling I realised a very interesting phenominon: Lack of Focus!

I started watching the people in the office and every single client I visited and this is everywhere. We seem expect that everybody is on the same page as we are and when they're not we get upset, like one motorist this morning, chattering away on his cellphone ignoring the green light only to cross when it just turned red.

Two robots later he's still going strong keeping everybody back as the robot turns green then amber and red again, ignoring or not even hearing the constant hooting of a plethora of angry motorists. You will find them everywhere be it on a cellphone in the car, supermarket, doing make up in the car, reading reports between robots or answering the cellphone while in a meeting.

So what does have to do with focus? Everything! In life you have a choice to determine your own focus or have someone-else do it for you. By doing one thing at a time and doing it well your life will start taking on direction. According to Dr. Caroline Leaf we cannot multi task even when we think we are multitasking! http://drleaf.com/blog/multitasking-is-a-myth.

So that being said how do I improve my focus? This is not so easy but with exercise in selfdiscipline this is possible for all of us.

Exercise 1 : Try for 1 week not to answer the phone while driving or when in a meeting. If you find it impossible put it in the boot or leave it with receiption.

Exercise 2 : When someone talks to you, drop what you do and actually LISTEN.

Exercise 3 : When driving just try to focus on getting from A to B without doing anything else but drive.

Keep it up for a week succesfully and then graduate to more things that you know impairs your focus. It's important that you must keep at it for at least 6 weeks as we establish a habit in just a few days but will take anything from 21 to 42 days to get rid of (replacing) a habit. It's also important to understand that we need to replace a bad habit with a better good habit. Thus if you like to snack while driving try to rather exercise your arms or stomach muscles while driving. If you're trying to quit smoking it's more difficult but replace the sucking with a peppermint or focusing on something else.

Remember your thoughts ( what you constantly think about) will result in actions which becomes habits, which in turn create your character and that my friend determines your destiny!