Today’s ‘balance’ tip is all about countering chaos with the power of grace & focus.
I love watching tightrope walkers at the circus- their elegance, grace, and focus is awe inspiring. The funny thing about the circus is often we use the term “3-ring circus” to describe chaos, but in reality everything done in a circus is done with precision and laser focus.
We can learn a lot about life by observing one in action, especially the tightrope walkers.
Focus on the Moment
The tightrope walkers don’t focus on the fact that they are 100 feet in the air. They don’t look at all of the faces staring up at them, all the circus acts going on below them, and then freeze in fear of falling. Of course not.
They take one step at a time, but keep moving forward to get to the other side. Hmmm-interesting. The tightrope walker focuses on the moment.
Focus on the Task at Hand
When we’re doing multiple things, we must not focus solely on the fact that we are doing multiple things. This can overwhelm us, and lead us to think negative thoughts, like “I am stressed- I have too much to do!” or “I will never get anything done!” or “This is impossible!”
Negativity gets us nowhere, except stuck in a rut. If we have a laundry list of things that need to get done, and we are thinking about all of them, what is happening to the present moment task at hand? For example, if you are at work, but worrying about what to make for dinner, you’ll spend more time on Google than finishing the materials you need for your presentation tomorrow. Then tomorrow morning, you’ll stress about the unfinished presentation, and focus more on the stress than the task, which will lead to sloppy results.
Focus on the Positive
The same is true when we are faced with a fear. I always feel far more “in balance” when I focus on faith instead of fear. Remember, having a positive attitude isn’t just our words, what we say, or even how we present ourselves. For a positive attitude to be more than words, it must be exemplified in our thoughts, our actions, and how we handle the situations we are presented with. It is a state-of-being.
Focus with Precision
Once we have an attitude of faith, it’s easier to have a precision in focus. Laser focus is basically how anyone who does anything gets it done. Laser focus is knowing what you are aiming for initially, and then focusing on the immediate task at hand. When we focus on the task at hand, and know that something else will follow soon, we keep moving forward.
This is true for anything we want to create in life, even the smallest of things, like driving to the beach. We have a map with a final destination, we know each turn we need to make and follow the immediate direction. We don’t jump ahead to the seventh turn before we’ve taken the right steps to get there.
When we live like this, in essence, we have the same “laser focus” as the tightrope walker. And we walk through life with grace and a “knowing”, even when we are faced with a fear, have a long to-do list, or there is a lot going on around us.
