Why Focus Comes Before Everything
Focus is the second most important thing to learn after reading, because a book teaches you nothing if you cannot stay on the page long enough to take the information from it.
Dandapani describes noticing the consequences on the days he does not apply his own tools, and repeats his guru's teaching that where awareness goes, energy flows. He explains that people have goals but no framework, uses baking as the example of a disciplined process, and makes the case for focus as the first step before meditation and energy management.
What this talk covers
- On the days he does not apply the tools in his own life, he sees the by-product and the consequence of that.
- Where awareness goes, energy flows, and whatever your energy flows to is what starts to manifest in your life.
- The biggest struggle for most people is not wanting goals, it is not knowing the structure, guidelines, practices and framework to get there, and baking is the example: a disciplined process where you cannot throw in random things and still get the final product.
- His teaching has three parts, focus, meditation and energy management, and the first step is learning to focus.
- He told a publisher his book was the second most important thing in the world next to reading, because a book is only relevant if you can read, and useless if you cannot focus long enough to extract what is on the page.
I said it's the second most important thing in the world next to reading.Dandapani
Questions
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Because focus is what lets you take in everything else. Dandapani compares it to reading: you can buy a book on any subject, but if you cannot stay on a page long enough to extract the information, the book is useless to you.
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He says most people know what they want but not the structure, guidelines, practices and framework to create it. He compares it to baking, which is a disciplined process where you cannot just throw random things in and expect the final product.
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Focus first, then meditation, then energy management. Learning to concentrate is the starting point.
Transcript
835 words · 4:37
So you're being the role model, the showcase for your own entrepreneurial product right now, right? Basically, yes. And you know, I also see it in my life and the days when I don't apply the tools in my life, I don't make progress. And I'm human. And it's not that I have German efficiency of 100% application every day. You know, some days I function at 50% and some days I function at 100%
and the days when I'm not applying the tools in my life, I see the by-product of that, the consequence of that. Yeah, I can totally relate to this. When I don't go into a week with a plan ahead, I usually stumble along and feel like I haven't
accomplished anything. And I always come back to what I've learned with and through you is that one of the main sentences that stuck with me is like where tension goes, energy flows, is that where I just tend to look left and right, a bit like a squirrel.
I get distracted all the time, right? And I think that was one of the main pillars that I learned from you. Yeah. It's a saying by my guru, right?
Where awareness goes, energy flows. We only, like I always say, we only have so much energy each day. At some point tonight, you and I are going to get tired and we want to go to sleep. And depending on how well we sleep, our energy goes back up.
The next day we go out, where are we putting our energy? And wherever we put our awareness, that's where our energy is flowing. And whatever our energy flows to, that's what starts to manifest in our life. I think the biggest struggle for most people is that everybody wants to create their goals
or their dreams in life. They just don't know the structure, the guidelines, the practices, the principles, the framework on how to do that. My daughter, I have a four and a half year old daughter and she was watching a baking
show yesterday. There was this contest where people had to bake different things. There's a whole structure and process to baking. They showed from start to end, but they have to follow those guidelines.
You can't just throw random things. It's not like cooking. Baking is a very disciplined practice. You can't just throw anything you want while you're baking.
in order to create the final product, you need the structure and in life it's no different. Okay. Well, because mentioned structure, I think that when I look at what you have built over the last 10, 11 years, and I mean, I had the privilege to have private sessions with
you. And that's how you started with entrepreneurial organization, with the entrepreneurs organization and different other companies, right? And now I look at the website, there is a structure and there are three areas where
I think one can train. And I mean, I may be, I mean, I may be correct me if I'm wrong, but it's one thing is about focus. Second one is about meditation.
And the third one is about energy management. Yeah, very accurate. The first step is learning to focus. And you know, I recently came out with a book and I don't know if you've seen it.
It's also out in German called The Power of Unwavering Focus. the German edition just came out a couple of months ago. And when I talked to three publishers that interviewed me to sign the contract for the book, and one publisher asked me, why do you think your book is important? I said it's the second most important thing
in the world next to reading. And he thought like, oh, he's very arrogant. He think his work is important. And I'm like, no, I said, a book is only important. The book is only relevant if you know how to read. If I don't know how to read, a book is useless.
That's the first thing I need to know, is to learn to read. The second thing I need is to focus. Because if I open a book and I start reading one line and I can't focus and I constantly get distracted,
how will I get the information from the book? So I can buy a book on e-commerce, I can buy a book on baking, I can buy a book on sports and energy management, on whatever.
But if I can't even focus long enough on a page to extract the information from the page. The book is useless to me. That's why we need to learn to focus as a 101, life 101.
Let's learn to concentrate. If I can stay, keep my attention on you long enough, I can hear the words coming out of your mouth. I can try and understand and I can process
and then hopefully make a change in my life.