How To Work On This Trait Made Easy: Become More Focused

Do you feel life getting out of control? Are your goals slipping through your fingers? Things can easily become unfocused in this crazy world filled with distractions and the need to hustle. What do you do about it?

Some people do the impossible? Take a look at Tom Cruise. An alright actor with a modicum of talent, he’s become a Hollywood icon in the last forty years.

When you look at the advancements in movie making and the insanity of his stunts, remember that Cruise is a driving force behind series like the Mission: Impossible Franchise, and the incredibly complicated stunts.

Some refuse to be denied. What separates most people from people like Tom Cruise is a laser-like focus, a focus they work to develop. Why is focus so important? It is because it gives us abilities.

An Easy Way To Focus

There’s nothing against digital apps and cellphones, except we’re on them for too many other things. While some people may be able to live digitally, there’s a much easier way to develop focus.

Focus can be developed by asking yourself a question. What is it that you need to achieve? What does that give you? It gives you a clear target.

By asking what you need to achieve, you develop a mission. Picture your goal or mission, and define it. Now, get a notepad and write down what it is you need to accomplish.

1. A clearly defined goal.
2. The things you need to get you there.

By writing down what you need to get you to your goal, you’ve listed your actionable steps.

Example #1: The Grocery List

People run around a grocery store with a pad or small notebook, picking up things as they go. What does it accomplish?

Using a grocery list helps you focus on getting what you need. You’ll be a more effective shopper because it:

1. Keeps you on task.
2. People buy fewer things they don’t need, leaving more money in their pockets.
3. You spend less time in the store by being focused.

Example #2: A Workout Plan

You walk into the gym and see a few people in better shape than you. You might notice they’re in the gym for shorter periods. They’re more focused on what needs doing on that day. At some point, they developed a plan.

Either getting some help or researching plans for the different body parts you work out will help you to be focused and more effective. It’ll also help you to record your achievements.

Workouts for chest day might consist of:

1. Cable flys: 3 Sets of 10 Reps
2. Inclined Dumbbell Press: 3 Sets of 10 Reps
3. Bodyweight Dips: 3 Sets of 10 Reps
4. Dumbbell Pullovers: 3 Sets of 10 Reps
5. Bench Press: 3 Sets of 10 Reps
6. 45 Minutes of Cardio

Once you know what you’re doing, have it written down and write down the weight you used. You’ll be able to easily look back and see where you started, and how much more you can move than before. You can see the results after four to six weeks, but you can feel the results after two weeks.

Example #3: Writing Plans

You have had that book idea in your head for years. You started it, then got sidetracked, and restarted it again. Could it be that you don’t have a focused plan, rather than the answer your internal monologue keeps giving you? It’s not that you suck, or that you can’t do it. A lack of focus and action keeps you from having a finished possibility of being published.

Your unfocused day keeps you from finishing your book idea. But if you change one little thing, you will have plenty of time to work on your book through the week. All you have to do is focus your time.

Focusing helps with things like time management. To focus your day, write down what you’ll do that day. What’s your plan?

By writing down what you’re doing with your time, you’ll also notice time you’ve spent on…nothing! That’s right, nothing. Aimless television hours, scrolling endlessly on social media, and engaging in things that don’t serve your purpose.

In Conclusion

A pen and a notepad are the easiest things to use to help you start to be more effective with your days, and get more of the things off your wish list and onto your to-do list. Once you’re doing things, you’re changing the most important part of your life. You are the only thing holding yourself back.

The advantages of the pen and paper list are there for the taking. When you commit to using one, it’ll help you define when to do things, what you’re doing, and keep you from wasting unnecessary time because you’ll be doing things more efficiently. You’ll have blocks of time to get things done, and instead of three hours to aimlessly wander a store, you’ll know exactly what you need and be there 25 to 50 percent less time than before.

Having a checklist to follow to do something like write a book will help you with your process. You’ll know that you are working on research because you wrote down what you needed to do to make your book a reality. You’ll plan to write from a particular time to a later time, because you blocked that period off for writing, and you’ll be less distracted by the world.

By using a pen and paper, and keeping it with you wherever you go, you’ll easily remember to look back at it and be reminded of what you wanted to do that day. The tactile experience of having it with you makes it more real, isolates your plan from the digital distractions and the world’s distracting chaos, and now you’re more focused.