Learn to Focus on the Hardest Thing First

“Intense concentration for hour after hour can bring out resources in people that they didn't know they had.”_Edwin Land

In this age of unlimited distractions, it is quite easy for anyone to spend a huge chunk of his or her days in sub-optimal engagements with little or no awareness. 

If we want to guard ourselves from that kind of limiting experience, we need to take a proactive step to save ourselves from the insidious pull of daily diversions. 

To achieve that, a simple strategy we can employ boils down to focusing on the hardest thing first, or as Brian Tracy would say, eating our ‘biggest frog first.’

And it means giving the best of our mental and physical energy to our biggest task of the day. After we accomplish that, we can then go a little easy on ourselves with how we apportion what’s left of our time, energy and attention to the rest of activities in the day.

Those preceding sentences align with the thinking of Steve Jobs who once hinted that if we adopt focus and simplicity on how we work, we can achieve something truly remarkable.

Simplicity and focus are all it takes to make the most our days. Complexity and distraction will always keep us away from performing at our dead-level best. 

We need to optimize our limited human resources by expending them on our most valuable priorities earlier in the day before the pull of distractions can get a chance to interfere with our personal effectiveness.

 

We need to eschew ‘busy being busy’ and instead be mono-maniacally focused on creating results that really matter.

Alas! It is amazing how effective one can be when he or she habitually focuses on the hardest thing first, everyday, before any distraction could ever get in the way.

Undoubtedly, it is much easier to do something great when interruptions don’t bid for our attention most of the time. The reason so few of us achieve what we are truly capable of is that we don’t adequately direct our focus; we rarely concentrate our mind on what really matters.

Finally, I challenge you—here and now— to start procrastinating on low value activities at the start of your days so can give maximum attention to the hardest things that can create breakthroughs in your life.