Stop and Focus

Focus is elusive.  We believe we know what focus feels like, but the truth is that we hardly put our mind completely on anything through the day.

There is a perfectly valid biological reason for this: Split attention was an advantage to our wild ancestor. Many dangers threatened the first men and women who wandered the African wilderness. Those who were able to keep an eye on the prey while stayed alert to the presence of predators out survived their less multi-tasking inclined mates. And we learned to split our focus.

Humans are not prey anymore, and for the most part, we don’t have to worry about tigers getting close. But the multitasking way of life remains valid.

It seems that nowadays we have so many more reasons to split our attention. We check emails and text while waiting in line, we listen to audio books or podcast while we drive and we watch TV or even surf the web while dining. So many things to do, but not enough time, right?

Multitasking can be beneficial on certain scenarios, but the problem is that we easily adopt it as a habit to a degree we cannot even realize we are doing it. Multitasking is, after all, a natural trait of those who survive.

A perk of civilization is that today we have the opportunity to stop and contemplate the world, and yet, we hardly do.

Contemplate Just for the Sake of It

A few mornings ago I woke up a little earlier that usual. When I was coming back to my room, I could not help but notice the break of dawn out of my window and for a second I froze and stand there, mesmerized. The room was in complete silence and for a moment I felt incredibly lucky. Such a simple moment could make me feel such strong emotions.

I felt great, but just for a second. Soon I ran for my smart phone to take a picture. I sent the picture to some friends and uploaded to Instagram. I wanted that everybody could see what I was seeing, and hopefully could feel at least something somehow similar. Then I noticed an email I had to respond, it would be just a second. But there were other two emails and then someone just texted me back.

By the time I look back up, the beautiful dawn was just another sunny day. Beautiful nevertheless, but not quite as magical.

I have lost a great, beautiful, emotional moment because I had some other three or four things to do. I had to share it, because that is the advantage of today’s world and I had to make it count. Always connected, always ON and always ready to “do something”.  And I realized that this is the way we go through our days, every day.

Stop Once a Day

We believe that by accomplishing as many tasks as possible, we are living our lives as best as we can, but the truth is that we lose much of what really matters about life because we are too busy in the “doing”.

Maybe is time to stop, to really stop for a moment and to enjoy and contemplate whatever we find around us. Our lives cannot be filled with things to do, because the most important thing that we REALLY have to do is to live and we cannot do that with our heads stuck in an inbox or in a checklist.

I am not saying that you should evade every responsibility that you have and go live the hippie life in a shack, I am just saying that we should prioritize a moment (or several, if possible) every day to contemplate something, anything. The important is not in what we focus about, but that we actually do. Find a moment and be quiet. Forget for a second all the things that you have to do and enjoy the silence and the beat of your heart. Even if only for a few minutes, be truly present and own this moment.

We are so used to always be doing something, that the first times we practice this we will feel uneasy and awkward but is also an addictive feeling.