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Writer's pictureTony Richards

Increased Success Is The Result Of Increased Focus

Our journey to our leadership destiny begins in our thoughts. It’s a consistent challenge to grow into being mentally disciplined. The path to where we want to be starts in our thinking. Our thinking leads to our words, our decisions and our actions, which explains why advertisers spend billions of dollars each year changing the way you think about their products, and they do that through repetition.

You, as a leader, are a product of what you think about.

This plays a huge role in your ability to focus. You can control and change the focus of your life, your business and your destiny by changing the repetition of thoughts which begin in your mind. Every permanent change you will experience will be from the result of practice and repetition. If you feel you have trouble focusing, it could possibly be that you simply need more practice with what you choose to think about. If you change the direction of your thought life, you will change the entire direction of your life. Focus is simply maintaining that direction you and your thoughts have chosen.

Being focused vs being busy

If you don’t examine too closely, being busy looks a lot like being focused, but the two don’t have a lot to do with each other. When you are focused, you spend a great deal of time thinking about and doing things which are related directly to the destination you want to reach. Focus empowers you to continue to build brick by brick to shape what they have envisioned. What’s interesting is at the end of a long day for both the busy person and the focused person, they will probably both be somewhat tired, but the focused person can review the events of the day and see the results of their focus leading to the materialization of a larger goal on a daily basis.

A busy person’s logic tells them they do not want to put all their eggs in one basket, in case they need to change quickly. A focused person believes strongly in a singular purpose, and the expansion they need in wrapped up in the singular purpose they have determined to focus upon.

Unfortunately, the average person tends to be busy, rather than focused and effective, which typically leads them to be stretched into the limitations of stress and fatigue. The above average focused leader will be stretched by the limits of their vision and priorities. As a whole, we seem to appreciate the draw of being busy, and the continual faster pace of our lives probably contributes to this as well.

Increased success is the result of increased focus. When you lack focus, direction & strength, your life can become a daily series of emergencies, rather than your intended plan. Most significant things that have been accomplished were done by a maniac on a mission with a single, powerful focus!

Keeping it simple

There’s an old saying which says when we try to be all things we end up being nothing.

We are a culture that promotes diversification instead of specialization. We value complexity over simplicity. Our love affair with being broad-based has led to being mediocre rather than excellent. Instead of being great at a very few things, we are average at best, and less than satisfactory at worst in dozens of things.

This happens because without a strong focus on a very few things in which to be excellent, there is no all-consuming passion and focus to keep driving us forward to superior visions, goals and results. The most powerful strategies are quite often, the most simplest ones. This exceptional focus and simplicity makes it easy to communicate to others what you are about, what your capabilities are, what your competencies are and even how they might be able to help you reach your goals.

Steps to focus

  1. Work on your thoughts- remember, your journey to your destination begins in your thinking. Practice each day on your thought life and notice how your words, decisions and actions were preceded by the thoughts you were thinking.

  2. Work on your vision- is it crystal clear to you where you want to go? Our focus deteriorates when we think too much about how and when without clear thinking on why and where.

  3. Fight for your priorities- your daily agenda is always be under attack. Is your daily focus stronger than this attack? You will have to fight for your priorities as other “busy things” try to push your focus to either side.

  4. Stay narrow, fight the pressure to go broad- keep working in your areas of strength and find resources and people to strengthen your weaknesses. Working in your weaknesses shifts your focus makes you weak.

Focus will sometimes cost you in the near term. You may feel that opportunities are passing you by. Focusing your life, your time and your energy will eventually benefit you tremendously; bring success and huge fulfillment to your life. Would you rather have some sort of instant gratification in the moment of today or resist the temptation of the distractions to pursue something more magnificent?

In the end, be a rifle instead of a shotgun. The shotgun may be louder, have more kick to it, and get a lot more attention. You, as a rifle may not make as much noise or get as much attention but you will be more effective and more reliable in your effort. This is needed for a more defined and specific target with a more focused force. Remember, you can achieve anything but you can’t achieve everything.

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