Focus

To accomplish any mission one must focus. The relationship can be expressed by the following equation:

Focus ====> Action + Behavior + Concentration = Power

In short, focusing on any action or behavior based on mission, steadied by a purposed concentration, unleashes power, and for human beings as with machines power is what drives the enterprise forward.

The relationship of the mind to concentrated focus can be compared to a water hose. If the hose has many holes water pressure cannot build, and the water pathetically will dribble out. But if the holes are repaired, when the spigot is turned on, the water will issue forth exuberantly. Is it not the same with a focused mind? The metaphor of the hose suggests that in focusing, a proper maintenance of the mind -- how it is dispersed and how diverted--may be all important. In the realm of action, many other conditions and situations that will divert or break our focus. Think of physical exhaustion and mental fatigue, worry and stress, will break our focus. Panic attacks will destroy focus. Poor management of our precious time, effort, money and creativity will degrade our focus and the absence of a mission will almost guarantee that focus will be diffused and scattered.

There are some people who like that perversity of nature, the vacuum, suck out all our vitality and our concentrated creativity. Here the problem is not that focus is distracted, but that it is too much absorbed. We must be greatly vigilant when we are in such situations and know the cost of their repair so that in time we can learn to see and to avoid them before they take physical form. Captain Ahab's undoing was not an inability to focus, but an overzealous focus -- which became a killing obsession -- upon the Great Whale, who in the end destroyed him, his crew, his ship, everything.

The key to focusing is to pick one thing and to do it well. Pick one action or one behavior -- we will discuss many examples in later chapters -- and concentrate your energy on this one thing, for a minute, an hour perhaps, and then return to it, steadfastly for a period of days. Usually a week is a good initial measure of practice. It took Carpenter Ch'ing just a week to fashion his magical instruments.

And when you focus, relax and know that the mind is productively engaged. Savor that on which you focus, discover its distinctive flavor. Understand it, for by understanding it you will come to understand yourself. It is a noble work.