Focus Is an Entrepreneur’s Superpower

How can we do something when we've never been taught how to do it or shown how it works? So with my daughter, you know, I will ask her, you know, where's your awareness? Which room is it? How old is she now? She just turned seven.

But, you know, she understands the concept. And it's something that, you know, I know I need to work with her for years to come before she fully embodies it. But she's very keenly aware that her awareness is moving or is in the unhappy place or is in the sad place, which is great. I remember when she was four,

she went up to my wife one day and said, Mama, can you move your awareness out of the angry area of the mind? I have something to tell you.

I thought it was, I was so proud. My wife was not impressed, but you know. Oh my God, that's great. But it just shows, right?

And there's another time when she was crying and she was upset and I was controlling her and holding her and trying to calm her down. And we started talking after a little while,

she calmed down and she said to me, My awareness is in the angry area of the mine, in the angry cage, and I locked the cage and I threw the key away.

And I was so proud of her because you know why, Dave? She understood where she was. She understood which room she was in. And like you said, you're observant of the fact

that you're reacting when someone jabs you and you said to me, that's the first step. The first step for my daughter is knowing which room she's in.

Because if she knows which room she is, she can leave that room and go to another room. So I left her after a little while and I went and played with her toys and she saw me playing with her toys and she came over smiling wanting to play with her toys with me. And I go like, what happened?

She goes, oh, I unlocked the cage and came out. It's like good for you. Yeah, that's. So once once we learn the concept, then we can start practicing it.

But if we don't understand the concept, it's very hard to practice something you don't understand. That's another thing you talk a lot about. You use the piano as an example. Like nobody just sits down and plays the piano.

The same is true with ADD. I think a lot of people in our business, in entrepreneurship tend to claim ADD. I'm one of them.

You know, where I'm like, oh yeah, my mind's all over the place. I can do a whole bunch of things all at once and it's hard to focus on one thing for very long.

And you take a position that what? What is your position on that? Again, I'm not an expert in this. I do believe some people have some kind of

chemical imbalance inside that causes them to be that way. But I think the majority of people is they become good at their awareness, jumping all over the mind because that's what they practice all day. And they've never been taught to keep awareness on one thing at a time.

And I think entrepreneurs use that as an excuse. I'm an entrepreneur. It's okay for me to have ADD. I like to challenge them and say, why can't you say I'm an entrepreneur and I'm able to be completely focused and present with all my clients, with my family, my friends,

and everything that I love. And that's my superpower. And I can still be an entrepreneur while doing that. And I've met people who built amazing business that have the amazing ability to be completely present.

So it's something, it's an easy out, right? And the concept here is also whatever you practice is what you become good at. So if all day you allow your ball of light

to jump around in your mind, your awareness to jump around in your mind, that's what you become good at. If I want to play for the Chicago Bulls,

I'd have to probably practice seven, eight hours a day. After six months, would I play for the Bulls? Most likely not, but would I be better at basketball? Absolutely yes.

So if I'm practicing distraction eight hours a day, I'm gonna be really good at it. After six months, after a year, I'll be an expert, after two years,

I'll be the Zen master of distraction because you become good at whatever it is you practice. And for me, it's not really about living a focused life, Dave, and it's not really about being focused.

I want to live an amazing life, Dave. And what is an amazing life to me? When I sit down with my friend, Dave Will in Boston, and we're having a glass of wine or coffee,

and we have two hours to just hang out, I want to be completely present. I want to hear everything Dave is saying to me. I want to hear the things he's not saying to me

that's in his mind that he's wondering whether he should say it or talk about. But I can only experience that if I'm focused, and focus allows me to be present.

And when I can give Dave Will my undivided attention, I tell him, I care about him. What he says matters to me. Right in these two hours, he's the most important thing in the world.

There's nothing else that matters. And that's how I show my love to my friends, the people I care about, you know, I giving them my undivided attention. And that's why I want to learn to focus.

Not about, not for the sake of focusing, but for what focus gives me.