Sweat & Smiles: Ease up on Focus, Pick up Specifics
By Melissa Romano on October 03, 2020 from Sweat & Smiles
I am a highly introspective person. This is a strength when used for self-examination and analyzing yourself and your motivations. It is imperative to use to understand your own personality, actions, and feelings. I am certain that is the only way to have healthy relationships, though I’m still working on that myself.
Introspection can also be a hindrance if, like me, you have a tendency to get lost in your own thoughts and lean more towards the over counterpart of analyzing. And then there are times where introspection lights a spark of magic through simple interactions that lead to 
profound changes. I believe it is this kind of introspection that has made me a better person and increasingly better at my job. One of these sparks occurred at my five-year-old son’s baseball game.
profound changes. I believe it is this kind of introspection that has made me a better person and increasingly better at my job. One of these sparks occurred at my five-year-old son’s baseball game.
If you are a parent you know the joy of finding the parent friends that become your saving grace at children’s events. Jenna is one of these people for me. Our son’s have been on the same baseball team for the last two seasons and Jenna and I are just the right amount of similar and different.
She worked many years as a professional coach so when I yelled out to my son “focus” she held no reservation in laughing and calling me out for “drinking the kool-aid”. Focus is a word I’ve used often with Cannon. I am not a big proponent of constantly shouting “be careful” and felt like focus was a good alternative. When Cannon was playing the infield by chatting it up with his friends and playing in the dirt, I yelled focus. Jenna schooled me on why focus is one of her least favorite coaching terms. Focus is a broad term, it gives no specific direction. As Jenna explained this my magic spark of introspection lit. It makes so much sense, with no specific direction what the heck are we focusing on?!
As we’ve discussed I spent a great deal of time in my own thoughts. I’ve thought of how often I beret myself for losing focus or needing to focus. I thought of how many times I’ve told Cannon to focus, probably sending him further into not knowing what to do. I realized all this time when I told myself, my son, or my clients to focus our brains probably start shooting around like a pinball machine, with the word focus jumping around looking for what to actually land on while simultaneously trying not to drop into the abyss.
I am sure you have told yourself that you need to focus on eating healthy, on work, on your physical fitness, on your relationships, and on anything in your life you want to change and improve. And each time it probably feels like beginning another round of pinball; the focus-on-eating-healthy ball shoots up and you frantically hit paddles attempting to keep the ball from dropping into the abyss without a thought on where it actually needs to be. Doesn’t sound much like what we’re going for when we say “focus” does it?
It is time to follow Coach Jenna’s expertise. It’s time to be specific. In the game I can tell Cannon to watch where the baseball goes, which is what I specifically wanted him to do when I yelled out “focus”. When it comes to eating healthy you could be specific in saying I am going to eat a fruit or a vegetable with every meal. With work you can say I am going to write down the top one to three tasks I need to get done right now. With physical fitness you can say I am going to move my body intentionally for 10 minutes every morning before I brush my teeth. With relationships you can say I am going to show gratitude to each person I speak to today. As you move forward introspectively and want to change or improve something be mindful of your “focus”. How can you be more specific with your direction to get you exactly where you want to be?
With specific focus on gratitude for you reading this,
Melissa
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