Change your focus to change your experience

What you focus on grows, as the saying goes. Today, I want to explore the power of focus – the second of the experience-shaping triad of story, focus, and state – to shape your life.

Where you direct your awareness and attention impacts what you experience and how you feel. On top of that, because of the way the brain is constantly rewiring itself, it also lays down the track for what you’re likely to experience and feel in the future.

Consciously directing your focus in a positive direction (e.g., through habitually asking, “What’s good here?” or reading inspiring books) both changes your experience of the here-and-now and builds a framework for a more positive experience in the future. Think of it as “focus management.”

Three components of focus management

 Broadly speaking, there are three main components to focus management:

• What you notice
• What you dwell on
• What you feed your mind

What you notice

What you notice is the starting point for what you focus on. And because of the way your brain works, when you focus on something regularly – things to complain about at work, for instance – it primes the pump for you to notice even more.

Fortunately, that works with positive noticing as well as negative. The more you look for the positive (through keeping a gratitude journal, for example), the more you will naturally start to notice it.

Positive noticing is the gateway to positive experience. It’s not rocket science. When you notice something, it enters your awareness. What you hold in your awareness (what you focus on) shapes what you experience.

Think of it as paints on a palette, some of which are the “color” of positive experience, and others the color of negative experience. When you make an effort to notice what’s good, it’s like dipping your brush into the positive color and using that to paint the picture of what you experience.

What you dwell on

Continuing with the painting analogy, what you dwell on – what you hold in your focused awareness over time – intensifies.

You may notice something positive, but that’s likely to skip in and out of your brain without making much of a lasting impact, like painting with a diluted color.

That doesn’t mean you’re somehow defective. It’s actually the result of the “negativity bias” our brains evolved to have, which puts more emphasis on staying safe in the face of potentially dangerous negative things than creating a positive experience.

The solution? Linger. When you notice something positive, let it soak in. Savor it. Really focus on it for 20 or 30 seconds before moving on. (This comes from a practice developed by psychologist and author Rick Hanson called “taking in the good.)

When you dwell on the positive, it intensifies the color. It gives the positive a chance to sink in and have a more long-lasting effect.

What you feed your mind

Think about all the things you feed your mind every day. How many of them paint a negative picture? Watching the latest calamity or outrage-worthy event on the TV news. Reading the negative news online. Having a complaint session with a co-worker. Going to the latest action movie jam packed with violence and death.

All those things can have a detrimental impact on your view and experience of the world, like a toxic drip system.

But you can also take advantage of the potential to feed your mind good things. Uplifting news about inspiring people. Books that help you learn and grow. Solutions journalism. Motivational speakers. Conversations with people committed to making the world a better place.

All those things can create an updraft in your mind, lifting your immediate perspective and shaping a more positive big picture view.

Try this: For the next week, notice what you feed your mind. Notice things like:

• The news you watch on TV or read online
• The TV programs you watch
• The conversations you have
• The social media conversations you get pulled into
• The movies you go to
• The books you read

As you get a better picture of what you’re feeding your mind, ask yourself, “What picture does it paint of the world? Is it the picture I want to foster?”

If it isn’t, explore alternative mind-food.