Self Improvement Made Easy

Success at anything is all down to how you focus your mind. However, most people aren’t really sure what focus means – the most common mistake being that it means that you need to focus on your goals. Now, obviously, you do need to have a good idea of what you’re trying to achieve but if you keep focusing on those goals, you will be completely unfocused on what you have to do in the present moment.

In other words, when it comes to being successful at whatever your chosen goal, the focus required is in the here and now. Very simply put, focus means paying an abnormal amount of attention to what’s going on now. In rugby, for example, the world’s leading place-kickers have a goal of being part of a winning team – but focusing on that, when they’re about to take an important penalty kick, won’t help because that “notion” is not tangible enough to focus the mind. So, instead, you see world-beating place-kickers focusing on the present moment – turn on the sports channels on your TV and you’ll see all major sports stars, in whatever field, using a variety of techniques to enable them focus on the present moment. In rugby, you’ll see them focus on their breathing (a ten-thousand year old form of meditation beamed live into your sitting room!) to clear their mind of everything except just that moment and it’s all important task. Watch the great golfers and the rituals they perform before each shot – again designed to clear their mind of everything except the task in hand. The same goes for the great tennis players, particularly before they serve.

Paying abnormal attention to the present moment will change your life. I’ve deliberately used the word “abnormal” because years of research in the field of psychology proves that normal people pay little or no attention at all to the here and now. As a result, they are not focused on the task in hand and they achieve nothing out of the ordinary as a result. However, if you want to be abnormally successful, you’re going to have to behave abnormally yourself – you’re going to have to learn to pay attention like a sports star.

Paying abnormal attention involves clearing it of all the noise that distracts the normal mind. This clearing process is achieved by turning your attention to what is really and truly happening in just this moment – to the exclusion of everything else. That’s why paying attention to breathing can be so powerful – that’s why meditation, which develops your mental ability to pay attention to just this moment, can be so powerful and life changing. On the other hand, even taking five minutes every morning to close your eyes, notice the sounds around you and feel the way your body moves with each breath will be a major leap forward for any normally unfocused mind.