Several people recently mentioned to me that they’re having a hard time focusing, and I too have noticed that it’s taking more will to stay focused than it used to. I suspect this is affecting a lot of us, so I thought I’d share a few steps that can help you get your focus back.
- Make a conscious decision to focus. When you want to unnecessarily reach for your phone, look at a website, click on a link, grab a snack, or any other activity that takes you away from what you’re trying to do, instead make a decision to not do it. When we have a conscious intent to not let our focus be scattered, it’s easier to stop behaviors that scatter our attention.
- Meditate correctly. Don’t space out and don’t think about other people. When you space out while you’re meditating, you are training your mind to space out! Also when you space out, you go to dimensions that aren’t clear and make clarity and focus harder.
When you think about other people when you meditate, you bring their energy into your aura. And you do not want other people’s thoughts, attitudes, and approaches in your mind! There are societal grooves you want to protect your mind from, and being scattered is one of them! You don’t want to align with the groove of phone scrolling, link clicking, and endless YouTube watching. - Get out of town regularly. When we work and sleep in the same place, we get enmeshed in the astral networks of our neighborhood, town, and work place, and get connected to their associated thoughts, worries, and addictions. Traveling out of the network breaks our connection to them. You need to get at least 100 miles away to feel the difference.
I’ve certainly felt the release of breaking these bubbles by getting out of town, but it was even more dramatic to watch it happen with some of my old students. One gal in particular was in such a funk, certain that nothing would ever work out again or be bright, and as we drove away and got about 100 miles away, it was like a bubble popped and she was happy and everything was just fine. She couldn’t believe how different she felt! - As a habit, unsubscribe from emails and remove apps from your phone, as needed. My story goes like this: I first removed Instagram. I was only following a few cool, high vibe accounts. There was no problem with the content, however I began to notice that I wanted to check it multiple times a day, so uninstall. Then later, same thing with the NY Times app. Not that I ever checked the news, but I loved the culture stuff, Social Qs, the Ethicist, Modern Love, etc, etc. Woof – uninstall. Then Substack. Argh. So many interesting newsletters! I found myself at work during the day wanting to check my personal email to see if there were any new email newsletters—totally interrupting my focus! Once again, unsubscribe, unsubscribe, whittle it down to a smaller set.
I’m sure the things that sap your focus are different than mine, but the groove at this time is the same. There’s endless content to consume, and bringing your attention to it keeps you from being focused and doing what is important to you. - Focus on high stuff. There’s so much fun and interesting content that is not high. Be honest with yourself about how what you are consuming is impacting you. You’re going to feel more mundane and less clear when you consume a lot of human-vibe content.
- Utilize to-do lists. I keep a work to-do list and a personal to-do list. Both track all the large and small things I need to do. In the morning at work, I prioritize what I need to do that day, and I reference it throughout the day. Sometimes there are so many distractions from chat, email and meetings, I forget what I should be working on, even if I looked at the list an hour before.
I also create mini to-do lists when I want to punch through a lot of stuff quickly. I write down several small tasks that I want to do, for instance during lunch, and then punch through them quickly one after the other. (For example, call the vet, make a haircut appointment, check on the return from a vendor, change air filter.) Similarly, on the weekend, I create a short list pulled from my bigger list, of what I want to get done. For example, this weekend I prioritized doing a write-up on Focus. 😀
When we love, light comes through our being and brightens us, lightens us and makes us feel happy. The love you express doesn’t have to be towards another person, it can be towards a great number of things—pets, plants, your artwork, sports, challenging experiences. In fact, love has very little to do with a person. It comes from us and it grows the more we love. We are happy when we love. We are unhappy when we stop loving.
Honesty with yourself is essential to being happy. You have to check that what you are doing in your life is working for you. Sometimes we have such a strong idea of how our life should be and what will make us happy, that we don’t want to face that these ideas aren’t right for us anymore. We may have grown out of them or they may have never been our ideas and dreams in the first place, but instead were imposed by family or society and accepted by us as ours. Other times we have invested so much time and energy to get our life to where it is, that we don’t want to face the fact that it is no longer working. When we honestly recognize that something is no longer working, then from this place of recognition we can begin to change it.
Mindfulness is the process of watching what is passing through your mind and stopping the thoughts that are draining or unhealthy. Most things only need to be thought through once. The rest of the thinking, the mulling over and obsessing, is not only draining, it actually makes it harder to objectively see what is best. When you keep your mind quiet and don’t play your worries, schemes and dreams over and over again, you create space for inner knowledge to bubble up and be heard.
A large portion of the thoughts and feelings you have are not yours, rather you pick them up from others. This may seem entirely shocking and untrue, but you can do an experiment to fact check this for yourself. Go for a hike alone on an uncrowded trail and take note of the number of thoughts you have. After you have been hiking for an hour or so, you’ll notice your mind is still and that you don’t have many thoughts. Next go to a mall or someplace crowded and walk around for a while and observe how many thoughts are running through your mind. In a crowded place you’ll notice your mind becomes very loud and full of thoughts.
How to Be Happy NOW 
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