Keeping Your Focus

One thing I really struggle with in life is to stay focused on just one thing. One the one hand, this ability to jump between things enables me to keep many things going at the same time. On the other hand, it can be really hard when a dedicated focus is required.

My life sometimes reminds me of the people who would spin plates on top of poles on a TV variety show. Things worked well when everything started up, but it would continually fall into peril as plate after plate started slowing down and wobbling, threatening to fall on the ground and make a serious mess. In spite of this threat, the spinner would somehow manage to always get back to the plate just before it fell, saving the day.

This often feels like my life, applying spin to another plate to keep from making a huge mess. While energizing at times (and boy can it be energizing), it can also seem quite discouraging at times, when the end of spinning plates never comes. While that is not accurate, it often seems that way things can run in life, at least for those of us with the ability to focus on many things. This ability to focus on many things often leads us to focus on "just one more thing" before being satisfied.

I am not sure what the complete solution is here. Just saying to "focus on fewer things" is nice in theory, but is highly unlikely to happen. Perhaps I will figure it out someday, though I expect I will be spinning plates until I am no longer able to do so. Not doing so would be far more frustrating anyway!

Brad