Being Focused In An Era Of Disorder

3 Major Reasons We Must Keep a Definite Sence Of Focus And Direction

Here is the big question… WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT OUT OF THIS LIFE?… For the things you’ve done, for the things you are doing now, and for those you intend to do… Where really is the center of your focus? Think about it for a moment.

For many people, the freshness of life is passing away so quickly. The work, marriage, passion or call to which they once committed themselves has degenerated into a lifeless burden. Hopes and ambitions which once defied all odds, have been forfeited. The joy of life has fled, seemingly, leaving our days hollow and our activities meaningless; more and more people have become very desperate, and because of  the plethora of unpredictable changes, duties, and distractions beckoning at us from all corners, many have lost focus… spending time with no sense of direction.

In the world as we know it, currently, Great is the thirst for happiness, and equally great is the lack of happiness. We all are longing for something more- whether within or without, majority of the people are oblivious- to give us an increasing sense of assurance for tomorrow and of purposefulness for today.  We live in an era driven by busyness, speed, comparisons, imitation, and competitions. The times in which we live has made superficial living common, and real life difficult. Extremely few people have discovered the true art and essence of living and being…  and have set their minds, firmly, to live intentionally and usefully.

But whether we want to or not, we are all bargaining at life’s counter every passing second of our lives… with every thought, word, action or inaction; we’re always spending the currency of  time allocated to us in exchange for something. Author, Henry David Thoreau said, “The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.” Screenwriter, Mae West puts it this way…she said “You only get to live once, but if you are willing to live with intention and on purpose, then once is enough.”

Here are 3 major reasons we must have a sense of focus and direction:

1. Our time is very limited; The only real currency you will ever have is time, and you do not get to save it for later use. We have no control over the dates on which we have been scheduled to exit our bodies… you know that the human body, no matter how well we keep, polish, and label it, it will still never be any different from the ground on which we walk; Your body will be only useful within a particular time frame and then it shall be dropped back into it’s ‘wardrobe’. It must be, therefore, in our best interest to live, daily, with a definite sense of direction. I read about, one of the founding fathers of the united states, Benjamin Franklin, who once wrote, “I would rather have it said ‘he lived usefully’ than ‘he died rich.’ the time bar of our lives is decreasing by the day.

2. There is no future ahead of us. All the time that you are meant to spend on earth is not ahead of you; it is trapped within the ageless being that you are, now, and merely unfolding with each passing day, materializing in accordance with your own words, thoughts and actions. A man can tell what his or her unborn days shall be like, by merely considering, now, the direction of the predominant things he or she talks about, thinks about, and does. Physician and writer George W. Crane said, “There is no future in any work. The future lies in the man who does the work.” The future is not in any external condition; when you birth out your tomorrow, it shall look exactly like your choices today.

3. The special abilities we possess and the dreams or callings in our hearts, are not given to us, but given through us; they’re meant to serve a certain people, in a certain way. But until we focus on the relevant aspect of the passing moments, we will never get to see the beauty of our true essence. none of us will ever find the richness of life in any territory by loose and casual wandering. Our focus then should not be to give to the body, the pleasures it craves, but to chain the clay, in all situations, in order to give through it the treasures within. I read that every day Benjamin Franklin asked himself in the morning, “Of what good shall I be today?” and in the evening, “ of what good have I been this day?”

Well, Mr. Franklin died 229 years ago. Today, you and I are here, breathing life away… deciding for ourselves. Why are you doing the things you do?… why are you not doing the thing you know you ought to do? whatever your answer be, you are paying for it with your own currency of time.

James Allen, the great thinker and author, said “It is easy in the world to live after the world‘s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great souls are the ones who in the midst of the crowd keep with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude and focus.”

Here are 5 points to help strengthen our sense of direction and focus:

1. Nobody is accountable for the things you think about, say and do, but yourself; Forces without will control you if you have no anchor or focus from within.

2. The biggest mistake we will ever make is to spend time in an effort to show to people, what we’re worth. Because the true worth of a man is not in any outward possession or appearance; it is within and can only be experienced and known by the peoples meant to benefit from our gifts and abilities. Not everybody will appreciate you no matter how good or helpful you are to them, and that is normal.

3. The design, path, and timing for each life on earth is distinct as ones fingerprint. The measurement of your success is limited to the areas of your distinct abilities and reason for being… Focus!  spend no time assessing someone else’s design. it is okay to learn from pertinent people, but it is wrong, frustrating and dangerous to compare your life’s ‘design’ to that of others.

4. For any given aspect of our lives, we owe it to God, to learn, to work on, to be and do our best according to the guiding intuitions/voice from within. By knowing what we are meant to do, we will know what distractions to ignore.

5. We should ask ourselves, daily, of what good would my current choices be, to the being that I am, in 20, 40, or 60 years from now?

At the heart of all conditions there is a place of undisturbed repose; As there are silent depths in the ocean which the fiercest storm cannot reach, so there are silent, sacred depths in the heart of every man which no condition, good or bad, can disturb; if only we will focus and access these depths of our being, we will find that life is not complicated but simple… it is not a fight, but an art to be learned and practiced. If we will throw off our dilutions, we will see that the birth and death of the body are the mere incidence of a journey and not our beginning or end. We will, above all else, be of single aim; have a legitimate and useful purpose, and devote ourselves unreservedly to it, Letting nothing draw you and I aside.

Life is not in our hands, time is not on our side, and even our bodies are not ours to keep. The only thing we really have is the power to choose, now. Take the time to figure out why you are, where you are and where you are headed. Then and only then, will you find the right answer when you face the big question; WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT OUT OF THIS LIFE?