Discipline 2: The power of positive focus

Great people live their lives with great focus. 2017 has just begun, and I am very confident that you can turn around your business/life by harnessing the power of positive focus. The reason why you are where you now is YOU. By being deliberate on what we focus on, we increase our levels of productivity. This article is a continuation of the series I am doing on what I call “The 10 Disciplines of Success”.

THE difference between successful people and failures lies in their levels of discipline. Go through the previous disciplines so that you can connect well with this article. Visit www.herald.co.zw and search my name for previous articles on the Disciplines of Success. This week I want to round up on this particular discipline, by challenging you to confront yourself.

Personal audit

One of the greatest favours you can ever do for yourself is to regularly confront yourself, and ask yourself some important questions about your life. You know yourself better than anyone else. I want you to ponder for a minute on these questions: ◆ “Where would your life/business have been by now had you been more focused on it?” ◆ “Where would your life have been had

you been more disciplined?” ◆ “Given a chance to live your life over

again, what would you do differently?” When you start asking yourself intelligent questions you also begin to get intelligent answers. I enjoyed one definition of FOCUS, “Follow One Course Until Success”. That is it! Set your goal and follow through it until you are successful. How disciplined have you been when it comes to focus? Are you not easily distracted?

One year to live

Anthony Burgess was 40years when he learnt that he had only one year to live. “It was January of 1960,” he said, “and according to the prognosis, I had a winter and spring and summer to live through, and would die with the fail of the leaf.”

His doctor had just diagnosed him with a brain tumour which was likely to kill him within a year. Within a short period of time all his life came before him. He was financially bankrupt at the time, and he knew that there was nothing for him to leave behind for his wife Lynne and family. He thought of something that could possibly help him leave a better estate.

Burgess had never been a professional novelist in the past, but he always knew that he had the potential to be a writer. Burgess realised that he could leave royalties for his wife. He put a piece of paper into a typewriter and began writing. There was no certainty that he would even be published, but he couldn’t think of anything else to do.

During that period, Burgess wrote energetically, finishing five and a half novels before the year went through. (This is very nearly the entire lifetime output of EM Forster, and almost twice that of JD Salinger who were some of the distinguished authors of his time).

Interestingly, Burgess did not die. His cancer had gone into remission and then disappeared altogether. He ended up surviving his wife. In his long and full life as a novelist (he is best known for “A Clock-work Orange”); he wrote more than 70 books. Burgess was able to make himself understood in some 10 languages.

Most probably without the news of the cancer, he may not have written at all. Aside from English, he knew Malay, Russian, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Welsh, Japanese, some Hebrew, Chinese, Swedish and several others. Burgess is also considered to be an important biographer and linguist, aside from being an outstanding composer, literary critic, journalist and writer. He was considered a veritable genius. On November 22, 1993, he died in London, aged 76. He would have turned 77 on February 25 the following year.

How different would your life be?

For a minute, put yourself in the shoes of Anthony Burgess. What would your life be if you had been told that you only had one year to live? What is it that you would do differently if you only had one year to live? Burgess for the greater part of his life had been operating in his comfort zone. It was the reality of life ending with no significant achievement that helped him to focus his life on building a meaningful legacy.

Many people are like Anthony Burgess, they are just sitting on their laurels. There is no sense of urgency, no sense of priority and not even any sense of focus on the future. You do not need to be told that you have some condition or disease in order to put your life into perspective. You need to make a deliberate decision to focus on your life.

Focus on dying empty

The late Dr Myles Munroe always talked about “dying empty”, and I think he died empty as well. Focus on maximising your potential. A human being is no different from a rubber band. A rubber band is only useful when stretched. You can become more useful in life and to life the moment you begin to stretch yourself. There are so many things that you can do as an individual if you apply your mind to stretching your potential.

Anthony Burgess stretched himself and wrote more than 70 books when the news of his coming death came to him. He could have died with all the 70 books had it not been for this push. Do not let mediocrity be your middle name. Set yourself up for a higher standard. Mahatma Ghandi once said, “The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing will suffice to solve most of the world’s problems.”

Focus builds momentum

Do you know one other thing that focus does? It builds momentum. The moment you start taking action in the area of your focus you build momentum. You become unstoppable. That is what happened with Anthony Burgess. The momentum he started writing, he never stopped until he reached 70 books. “When you stay focused and keep a commitment you create momentum, and momentum creates momentum.” (Rich Fettke)

I will continue next week on the following Discipline. Do not miss the next edition of The Herald Business.