Focus

One of my (many) contrarian beliefs is that we do not have strong enough preferences. We often blame social media or the speed of information as the reason why we’re easily distracted, but the real reason behind our inability to focus has less to do with the sheer quantity of media and more to do with our laziness when it comes to distinguishing wh... See more

Maintaining focus becomes easier because ideas become less interesting. “Experts literally experience a different world within their specialism,” Tom Morgan pointed out . Experts perceive more layers and details, they see patterns and nuances invisible to others. Their experience of the same domain is richer, more interesting, and filled with an in... See more

“There’s nothing I revile quite as much as a dilettante,” Seinfeld told GQ , “ I don’t like doing something to a mediocre level.” Escaping mediocrity requires focus. “You have to dedicate yourself to these great things,” he added. “And I don’t believe in being good at a lot of things—or even more than one.”

We can't build a sustainable business by chasing every opportunity.

A sustainable business is strategically constrained. Its leaders know what the business is and, more importantly, what it's not.

Achieving strategic clarity is hard. It takes asking tough questions about tradeoffs, deep concentration to get to the very essence of the issues and real courage to cut off competing priorities. It is worth the effort because with real clarity, people, teams and organizations can fully mobilize, break through to the next level and achieve somethin... See more

One of the things Steve [Jobs] would say [to me] because he was worried I wasn’t focused — he would say, “How many things have you said no to?” I would tell him I said no to this. And I said no to that. But he knew I wasn’t interested in doing those things. There was no sacrifice in saying no [to those things]. What focus means is saying no to some... See more

Being alive consists of nothing more than the sum of what we pay attention to.

The trick is to collide your mental model with the outside world as often as possible. This is what exploring does.