Book Summary: Focus by Daniel Goleman

In many respects, what you pay attention to and focus on determines your level of success.

It would be hard for us to exist in the current world if we didn't have focus. At the same time, the society we live in is so full of distractions that staying focused on one subject for lengthy periods is becoming increasingly difficult.

According to Daniel Goleman, the father of emotional intelligence, three sorts of focus exist: inner, other, and outer. According to Goleman, a well-lived life necessitates skill in each area.

We may enhance our performance in any aspect of our lives by knowing and strengthening our talents in those three areas.

For the following ten minutes, we'll look at how to accomplish precisely that.

The Anatomy of Attention

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To grasp the concept of focus, we must first understand the concept of attention.

The quickest place to begin is with distractions, which are the things that cause us to lose focus.

Many things in today's society might divert our attention away from the things we need to achieve.

The two distractions

Sensory and emotional distractions are the two primary forms of distraction.

Sensory distractions are simple to see and control to some extent. When you're reading, for example, you shut out nearly everything that's going on around you. The constant barrage of background noises, forms, colors, scents, and other stimuli is filtered out by your brain.

Emotional distractions are more difficult to detect and handle. The most difficult obstacle is the emotional upheaval in our life. It's very hard to concentrate on your work following a fight with a family member at home.

The two systems

The brain functions on two systems, much like there are two sorts of distractions that might lead us to lose our focus.

First, there's the bottom-up mentality, which is:

• quick, and operates in milliseconds;
• uncontrollable and always-on
• intuitive, working based on association networks;
• impulsive and emotion-driven;
• the one who carries out our habits and directs our activities;
• the manager of our mental conceptions of the world

The top-down mind, on the other hand, is as follows:

• slower;
• intentional;
• arduous;
• the seat of self-control, which may (occasionally) override automatic routines and emotional impulses;
• capable of learning new models, making new plans, and taking control of our intuitive repertoire - to a degree.

Our voluntary attention, willpower, and intentional choices are all top-down. Our Bottom-up processes govern reflexive attention, impulses, and habits. As a result, our minds are always juggling between stimulus-driven attention and deliberate focus.

On the other hand, your brain wants to employ the bottom-up method since it loves to save energy. We end up burning energy whenever we use the top-down system.

That's why it's difficult to learn new things or make changes in your life; your brain prefers not to do so since it's simpler not to.

When your mind is adrift

It's natural for your thoughts to wander. Whether you ask individuals if they're thinking about something they're not doing right now, they'll probably say yes 50 percent of the time.

This clearly affects your capacity to be "in the moment" and concentrate on the work at hand. And it's for this reason that the notion of mindfulness has gotten so much attention, energy, and money.

"The voluntary bringing back of a wandering attention, over and over again, is the very root of judgment, character, and will," stated William James, a pioneer of American psychology.

Even a wandering mind, though, has its purposes. This is because your daydreams are frequently centered on resolving unsolved issues. It also enables the investigation of previously unrelated concepts, which is the wellspring of creativity.

Your objective is to switch between mind wandering and staying concentrated on the work at hand whenever you choose.

That may seem insignificant, but it's a crucial issue. You can only stay concentrated for a certain length of time before you need to recharge your brain's batteries.

As Goleman points out, surfing the web mindlessly, playing video games, or answering emails does not do the trick. Doing things like taking a walk in nature and —you guessed it, meditation—work perfectly.

Inner Focus: Self-Awareness

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Now that we've discussed how attention works, let's move on to the first area of focus you should master yourself.

Self-awareness

Turning your attention inward and listening to what your body is telling you can help you make great life decisions.

Self-awareness may be divided into two categories.

"Me," which is the part of you that constructs narratives about your past and future based on your life experiences thus far.

Then there's the "I" that exists right now. This is the part of you that is in tune with your body and may give you some idea if a decision "feels" correct.

The two primary methods to continue to grow more self-conscious are to be aware of both the narratives you've built up during your life (so you can modify them) and to be in tune with your body.

Seeing ourselves as others see us

You won't acquire a comprehensive image of yourself until you see yourself as other people view you, no matter how skilled you grow at self-awareness.

A 360-degree evaluation, in which you are asked to rate yourself on various aspects, and then your self-ratings are compared to those of other individuals who have assessed you for the same things, is one certain method to obtain an accurate picture.

Surprisingly, studies have shown that the larger the gap between the scores you give yourself and the scores others give you, the higher up the organizational food chain you are.

Assuming you are a leader (or aspire to be one), reviewing these sorts of ratings regularly can assist you in understanding how you are viewed.

It is always helpful to consult with people who are close to you, as they will see what you can't.

Willpower

We won't spend a lot of time on this (read or listen to our entire overview of the book Willpower for a comprehensive primer on willpower), but your level of will affects a lot of your life success.

Numerous studies demonstrate that children with strong levels of willpower earn more money and make better health decisions as adults. They also commit fewer crimes if that's something you're interested in.

Willpower is the ability to resist your desire or impulse and focus instead on what you want more.

When you're distracted by an impulse, such as a platter of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies on the table, your reward circuits focus on what's appealing about them: chewy, hot, and tasty.

What's fascinating is that by changing your emphasis to something new about the cookies – they're round, have dots on them, and are baked – you've shifted your concentration and reduced the likelihood of you reaching for and eating the cookie.

Self-awareness at its best is becoming aware of how and why things entice you and deliberately moving your attention away from those things when they arise. This will help you make better judgments.

Other Focus: Reading Others

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Empathy is the capacity to pay attention to what other people are going through. There are three distinct types.

Cognitive empathy allows you to put yourself in another person's shoes, understand their emotional state, and control your own emotions while assessing theirs. The majority of these are top-down activities.

Emotional empathy is the act of feeling what someone else feels. You are built to experience another person's delight or suffering even before you can think about it. This is a bottom-up process that is primarily developed during infancy.

Finally, the empathetic concern goes a step further by encouraging us to care about the other person and intervene if the circumstance requires it. This is a bottom-up (automated) and top-down (thoughtful) function, and doing it right is crucial.

Many people, for example, who arouse too many sympathetic sentiments for others end up suffering themselves, to the point where they lose their ability to act.

On the other hand, those who exhibit little sympathy for others (either naturally or via training) lose the capacity to put themselves in other people's shoes and understand their emotional signs - a good predictor of success in most professions.

It turns out that the greatest approach to practice reading other people is to increase your empathic concern to the degree that allows you to connect with the other person without losing control over the feelings you experience.

Outer Focus: The Bigger Context

The larger picture is the final place to investigate.

Understanding patterns and systems are required to grasp the broader picture of things.

Goleman points out that systems are not visible to the human eye. We all suffer from system blindness as humans. When the cause and effect are separated in time and place, we have difficulty grasping them.

As a result, many of our remedies work in the short term but exacerbate issues in the long run.

Here's an illustration: building more and broader roadways is a straightforward and apparent solution to traffic congestion. It is simpler to travel about in the near term (once the roads are constructed).

However, individuals rapidly begin to take more vehicle journeys, relocate further away, and purchase more automobiles. They are making the long-term traffic problem even worse.

This indicates that humans have difficulty comprehending problems that occur over a longer time horizon, such as global warming.

Rather than focusing on the disadvantages (such as our carbon impact), Goleman recommends that we concentrate on the good aspects of our activities, which we can see right now.

Negative emotions are poor motivators in the long run, and we are programmed to avoid them, so this is a preferable strategy. Positive emotions, on the other hand, are powerful motivators that may last for a long time.

The Well-Focused Leader

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Finally, how you bring it all together as a leader will determine whether or not your team succeeds.

As the preceding sections demonstrate, we all have a finite amount of energy to devote to attaining our objectives. Your most important leadership action is to direct that emphasis where it is most needed.

Organizations, as Goleman points out, require leaders who are focused on achieving outcomes.

However, when leaders tell others what to do or do it themselves, the effects will be more durable in the long run. On the other hand, leaders require a different focus, one that is motivated by the desire to see others succeed.

The more you tap into all the different inputs, including inner, other, and outer inputs for your decisions, the more effective and well-rounded your style of leadership will be.

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