Why I Treat Life as Focus Practice
I learn to focus because I want a great life, and focus is what lets me sit with my daughter or a friend and experience them fully instead of being somewhere else.
Dandapani explains that whatever you practice is what you become good at, and most people have practiced distraction until it takes no effort at all. He treats his ordinary encounters as the practice ground for focus, and says the reason to learn it is the life it produces: full hours, real conversations, and no room for regret at the end.
What this talk covers
- Whatever you practice is what you become good at, and people are so practiced at distraction that they do not have to try.
- The point is not focus itself; the point is deep, profound experiences with the people you love and the experiences in your life.
- When he is concentrated on his daughter he can hear what she is saying and also receive the messages she is afraid to say or does not know how to say.
- The by-products of a focused life are enjoying the meal instead of photographing it, and listening to a friend instead of half hearing them.
- He chooses who is in his life, keeps a list and re-evaluates it, and when he is with someone the phone is not on the table and he is completely there.
I have a rich life because every hour is full.Dandapani
Questions
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Telling someone to learn to focus invites the question why. The reason is the life it makes possible: a full life, a happy life, where you can be with the people you choose and experience them completely.
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He uses his own encounters and relationships as the practice. If he chooses to be with someone, he is there one hundred percent, the phone is not on the table, and he hears every word they say and the things they are not saying.
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By making every hour full. If he were run over by a bus tomorrow he could say that was a full life, with no wishing he had spent more time with someone or been less distracted with his children.
Transcript
629 words · 3:18
Whatever you practice is what you become good at. We practice distraction so much. We become so good at it. In my workshops that I do, my events, I always ask people,
who here put your hand up? It's really good at distraction. So many people put their hand up. And then I ask them, how hard do you have to try to be distracted?
Because I don't have to try. It just comes naturally. Because you practice, you become a master, it becomes who you are. Your patterns in your mind are trained that way.
Same way, you can learn to focus. But the important thing, Sven, is it is not about focus, right? And I think that's where people misunderstand. Why do we want to focus?
I want to focus so that I can have deep, profound experiences with the people that I love, with the experiences in my life. When I sit with my daughter, I can be concentrated on her and experience her fully. I can see what she's... I can hear what she's saying.
I can see what she's doing. I can get the uncommunicated messages that she's telling me through her body language or something she wants to share with me, but maybe she's afraid or she doesn't know how to.
I can get all of those messages if I can focus on her. I'm always distracted. I don't. I go somewhere.
I get a meal. I can enjoy the meal instead of spending time taking photos of the meal and then color correcting it and posting it on Instagram and watching it get cold instead of actually enjoying the meal.
sit with a friend and enjoy my friend and listen to my friend. All those things are the by-products of living a focused life and that's why I want to learn to focus because I want to have a great life and because I want to have a great life I learn to focus and focus helps me to have a great life. If you just tell somebody learn to focus they go why, why should I do it? But if you tell somebody
do you want to have a great life, do you want to have a full life, a happy life, this is one of the biggest tools that can lead to that, then say, okay, I will do it. So, Dandapani, what you're basically saying is that you are using your personal encounters and your relationships, you live in like the moments, like as a training camp to focus, right?
Exactly. I choose who's in my life. I choose the people in my life. I choose who I talk to. I spend time. You know this about me. I'm very particular about where I interest my energy, how I focus, who's in my life. I make a list of people in my life. I reevaluate that. what I do with my life, where I focus my energy.
So if I choose to be with someone, then I am there with them. 100%. My phone is not on the table, nothing. I am completely there and I can fully enjoy them. I can hear every word they're saying to me, things they're not saying to me,
things they're feeling. I have a rich life because every hour is full. So if I get run over by a bus tomorrow, I can go, wow, that was a full life island. I don't have to look back and go like, oh, I wish I spent more time with this person.
I wish I did that. I wish I spent time with my daughter and not also distracted or my son. There's no opportunity for regret, you know, at the end of life.