Focus Quotes

focus quotes

“Focus can be a grueling thing to keep, but when you realize it will bring you through the doorway of your dreams, it becomes something you can’t help but do, like breathing.” Stephanie Schneider

“Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four hour days.” 
― Zig Ziglar

“But how?" my students ask. "How do you actually do it?" 
You sit down, I say. You try to sit down at approximately the same time every day. This is how you train your unconscious to kick in for you creatively. So you sit down at, say, nine every morning, or ten every night. You put a piece of paper in the typewriter, or you turn on the computer and bring up the right file, and then you stare at it for an hour or so. You begin rocking, just a little at first, and then like a huge autistic child. You look at the ceiling, and over at the clock, yawn, and stare at the paper again. Then, with your fingers poised on the keyboard, you squint at an image that is forming in your mind -- a scene, a locale, a character, whatever -- and you try to quiet your mind so you can hear what that landscape or character has to say above the other voices in your mind.” 
― Anne Lamott

“If you want to concentrate deeply on some problem, and especially some piece of writing or paper-work, you should acquire a cat. Alone with the cat in the room where you work ... the cat will invariably get up on your desk and settle placidly under the desk lamp ... The cat will settle down and be serene, with a serenity that passes all understanding. And the tranquility of the cat will gradually come to affect you, sitting there at your desk, so that all the excitable qualities that impede your concentration compose themselves and give your mind back the self-command it has lost. You need not watch the cat all the time. Its presence alone is enough. The effect of a cat on your concentration is remarkable, very mysterious.” 
― Muriel Spark

“Focus was the main thing that saved me through my heartbreak.  Everything else in the day felt like a dream, floating mindlessly through in some surreal way, like a series of nightmares that wouldn’t die; but when I focused on accomplishing my book, it reminded me I had power, that I was still in control, that my fate was still un-said and being written.”  Stephanie Schneider

“Those who can't stop concentrating on the awful truth are said to suffer from obsessive-compulsive disorder. The irony, of course, is that psychiatric diagnosis notwithstanding, these tormented attenders are "the rational ones," says the Penn psychologist Paul Rozin. "The rest of us live in a disgusting world, too, yet to function, we somehow don't concentrate on that. We focus on something else, unless the contamination is overtly called to our attention.” 
― Winifred Gallager

“Among these temperamentally unhappy campers are "reactant" personalities, who focus on what they often wrongly perceive as others' attempts to control them. In one experiment, some of these touchy individuals were asked to think of two people they knew: a bossy sort who advocated hard work and a mellow type who preached la dolce vita. Then, one of the names was flashed before the subjects too briefly to register in their conscious awareness. Next, the subjects were given a task to perform. Those who had been exposed to the hard-driving name performed markedly worse than those exposed to the easygoing name. Even this weak, subliminal attention to an emotional cue that suggested control was enough to get their reactant backs up and cause them to act to their own disadvantage. All relationships involve give-and-take and cooperation, so a person who habitually attends to ordinary requests or suggestions like a bull to a red flag is in for big trouble in both home and workplace.” 
― Winifred Gallagher

“He well knew his mind's natural tendency to be endlessly on a thousand subjects at once, to flit from this to that and to the next thing to no particular purpose--indeed, he called it his "butterfly mind.” 
― Eric Metaxas

“It’s focus that takes us out of our heads and ushers us into an incredible reality.” Stephanie Schneider

“Because you actually might not know what activities truly engage your attention and satisfy you, he says, it can be helpful to keep a diary of what you do all day and how you feel while doing it. Then, try to do more of what's rewarding, even if it takes an effort, and less of what isn't. Where optimal experience is concerned, he says, "'I just don't have the time' often means 'I just don't have the self-discipline.” 
― Winifred Gallagher

“Knowing the Techniques of Survival........
Our fears and anxieties will often drive us to build impenetrable walls that act like blinders deflecting others and preventing us from seeing who surrounds us. Getting focused to the things that matter are the Key to what has to be to COMPLETE our MISSION. "I Had Every Excuse to Fail but I Chose None" Speak Life!!!
(sky)” 
― Sebastian K. Young

“Sometimes, we feel conscious but unable to move our body. 
The first thing to do is focus in a prayer, then start to wink frequently.
By this way, slowly but sure our body can be moved totally by our persistent willpower.” 
― Toba Beta

“Sometimes it takes sitting still, going nowhere, focusing…to launch us into all we wish to be.” Stephanie Schneider

 “The whole concatenation of wild and artificial things, the natural ecosystem as modified by people over the centuries, the build environment layered over layers, the eerie mix of sounds and smells and glimpses neither natural nor crafted- all of it is free for the taking, for the taking in. Take it, take it in, take in more every weekend, every day, and quickly it becomes the theater that intrigues, relaxes, fascinates, seduces, and above all expands any mind focused on it. Outside lies utterly ordinary space open to any casual explorer willing to find the extraordinary. Outside lies unprogrammed awareness that at times becomes directed serendipity. Outside lies magic.” 
― John Stilgoe

“Making yourself focus on a task, alone, can be a genuinely lonely and daunting thing.  It’s the silent, future applause of success ringing in our ears that makes us go just one hour more.”  Stephanie Schneider

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