Build Focus Without Adding a Thing
Rather than adding a new practice to your day, take the non-negotiable events that already recur in it, talking with your child, eating, taking a shower, being on a call, and give each one your undivided attention.
Dandapani explains how to build concentration without adding anything to an already full life. You identify the non-negotiable reoccurring events in your average day and insert the practice into them, which for him adds up to more than five hours of concentration practice daily.
What this talk covers
- Identify what he calls the non-negotiable reoccurring events in your average day.
- Talking with his daughter is non-negotiable and happens every day, so he gives her his undivided attention and counts that as concentration practice.
- Two hours a day with his daughter, close to two with his wife and an hour and a half with clients and his team brings him to about five and a half hours of practice.
- If he told you to add 45 minutes of yoga, half an hour of meditation and ten minutes of breathing tomorrow morning, you would not do it, because your life is already full.
- You do not need one more thing in your life to do, so leverage what already happens, eating, showering, client calls, and give each of those your undivided attention.
You take the existing things that are in your life and you insert the practice into them.Dandapani
Questions
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You do not add anything. Dandapani says to take the events in your day that are non-negotiable and recur anyway, such as meals, showers, calls and conversations with your family, and give each one your undivided attention.
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Something in your average day you cannot opt out of and that happens every day. His example is talking with his young daughter, because he cannot tell her he does not want to talk to her.
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In his own day, about two hours with his daughter, up to two with his wife and at least an hour to an hour and a half with clients and his team, which comes to roughly five and a half hours of concentration practice.
Transcript
711 words · 3:48
How can you actually create new routines and new patterns in your life? Like where do you start? Is that tiny steps you could take? Yeah.
So, what I would recommend people in this series about focus is to read my book, The Power of Hanway Ring Focus. In the book, I talk about creating rituals, creating rituals that stick. The best way to do that is to identify what I call the non-negotiable
reoccurring events in your average day. So it's a long sentence. So I'll give you the non-negotiable Reoccurring events in your average day. Okay average day would be a Monday to Friday. Okay, what is a non-negotiable? Reoccurring event every day I talk to my daughter. It is non-negotiable
I can't say to my four and a half year old daughter. I don't want to talk to you. It doesn't work So it's non-negotiable and it reoccurs every day So every time I talk with her I give her my undivided attention So if I talk with her for two hours with her for two hours a day, that's two hours of practicing
concentration. I'm using that opportunity, leveraging that opportunity to practice concentration. Because if I say to you, Sven, tomorrow I want you to get up and do yoga for 45 minutes, meditate for half an hour, and do your breathing exercise for 10 minutes. You're not going to do it. You say my life is full. I have a toddler. I have a business.
I don't have an hour and a half in the morning to do all this stuff. But if I say every day Sven, do you talk to your partner? You say yes. Do you talk to your daughters?
Yes. So leverage that opportunity that recurs, reoccurs every day that is non-negotiable and use that as an opportunity to practice concentration. So I talk to my daughter two hours a day.
I talk to my wife an hour and a half, two hours a day. That's four hours of practicing concentration. I talk to clients, my team, at least an hour, hour and a half a day. Now I'm up to five and a half hours of practicing concentration.
You told me that if I wanted to play for Bayern Munich, I need to practice six hours a day. So I'm up to five and a half hours of practicing concentration. So hopefully, I'll be Bayern Munich level of concentration very soon, if I practice like this every day.
And that's how you become good at something. You take the existing things that are in your life and you insert the practice into them. Yeah, that's super another point. And I think for me, it's always good to have little anchors that actually feedback me to see that
if I'm on the right track. And it's like sometimes it's tiny steps, minor steps. And people always say, I used to integrate the cold shower in the morning just to remind me that this is a non-negotiable and I can do it. And I'm doing it for three years. So I'm building self-confidence that I can actually create a new pattern. And again, the non-negotiable is the Cree, right?
Is it fair for me to say, Sven, that you have more than enough things to do in your life right now? Is that an accurate statement? That's a very accurate statement.
Yes. You don't, you don't need one more thing in your life to do, right? Oh, yeah. So if I give you a practice to do, you're going like, Oh, that's one more thing.
So instead of adding one more thing to your life, leverage the things that are non-negotiable in your life, taking a shower, every day you have to eat. It is non-negotiable. Give your food your undivided attention.
Every day you talk to your children. Give your children your undivided attention. You know, every day you're on a phone call, perhaps with a client. If you're a client, you're undivided attention.
So rather than adding more things to your life, you're leveraging the things that are already happening in your life to build equality. And this quality, the skill is the skill of focus,
the ability to focus.