Written by Garin Kilpatrick
Focus is the underrated blade that can help you cut through the clutter in your life and get you straight to your goals.
As you exercise your ability to focus on what really matters the mental muscle you build will render ravishing results and get you more free time to enjoy the finer things in life.
With effort focused like a magnifying glass on the important goals in your life you can achieve your goals with blazing success.
In this post I’ll share with you my top tactics sharpening your focus like a laser so that you can better tackle the most important goals in your life.
1. Eliminate Distractions
Distractions are murderers of focus and achievement. Eliminate every distraction possible and try to create an environment where you can create at peak performance.
For me this means that when I am in the zone I don’t listen to certain music because some songs have the power to pull me into the music and away from the task at hand.
A few ideas for music to work with are the instrumental jams of Deadmau5 and Skrillex if you are in a high energy mode, or the station Groove Salad on soma fm if you are feeling chill.
Eliminating random environmental noise with noise reducing headphones is also a definite plus.
2. Be Specific About Your Goals
Simply saying “I want to be rich” is a goal without much substance.
Substantial goals have specifics; once you get specific about what you want you can set to taking the specific actions that you need to take to get the results you want.
Owning a Lamborghini Aventador is one of my goals. This car costs $387,000, which means that to buy it I will need to make a little over $1,000 a day, for a year. Totally attainable.
Another one of my goals is to net a million dollars in revenue, in a year.
A million dollars in a year is $2739.73 a day. In order to achieve $2739.73 a day I will need to sell about 28 copies of my FBPower Facebook Marketing Training product a day, 7 days a week.
In able to hit 28 sales a day I am going to need to continue to provide massive value for my customers and focus in on the things that will seriously drive sales for my business.
FBPower will need to remain on the cutting edge so that my refund rate remains very low, and I should expand into other product categories asap.
The specific points of action above would not necessarily follow from “I want to get rich” goals get specific and their costs are understood then the specific actions needed to get there become increasingly apparent.
3. Get Plenty of Sleep
Good luck finding fluid focus if you are running on only a few hours of sleep.
Sleeping relaxes and refreshes your body and gives your sub-conscious a chance to think about and decode challenges that might have caused you frustration throughout the day.
Everyone is different, but I have found that seven to eight hours is ideal.
4. Exercise on a Regular Basis
Exercise is an amazing natural way that you can eliminate stress from your life and help make you able bodied and open to addressing the challenges that you face every day.
If your work does not involve much physical activity making sure you get exercise can seriously help you improve the quality of your work and the quality of your life.
Exercise not only strengthens the body; it sharpens the mind.
5. Review Your Goals Often
Without reviewing your goals you might forget them, and if you forget your goals the chances you will achieve them are slim to none.
Keeping a list of the goals you hope to achieve will help you keep these goals in mind so that they don’t slip away from your grasp.
Don’t just have grand goals, it helps to start with small goals that will help you build the momentum you will need for massive success.
6. Tackle The Most Important Tasks First
Getting most important tasks done first is both the most efficient way to begin your day and a method that will encourage you to vigorously tackle other tasks.
7. Develop Successful Routines
Yesterday I hit a goal at the gym I have been striving towards for two months. I have put on 15 pounds of muscle in two months and the number one reason I got these gains was thanks to my solid routine.
Every evening five nights a week I hit the gym with my friend Tj. We go at the same time every night unless something serious comes up. Thanks to this routine I have seen more gains in strength and size in the past 3 months than I saw in the entire year previous.
Routines can strengthen your success in whatever aspect of life you apply them to.
8. Apply the Pareto Principle
The Pareto principle suggests that in many instances about 80% of the results are derived from 20% of the effort.
Apply this principle by analyzing the activities that give you the results you want and focusing your energy on doing more of the activities that give you the greatest results.
In the world we live in where there is infinite distractions those who are able to apply the Pareto principle (Also known as the 80/20 rule) and focus on the most valuable actions will reap the lions share of results.
9. Track Your Progress and Make Improvements
By tracking your progress you create emphasis on the variables that directly influence your success.
Conversely, if you fail to track you are on track to fail.
I have found that by focusing on the variables that matter to my business (such as traffic, subscribers, and sales) I am able to improve my results and discover which actions are the most important for improving my results.
10. Drink More Water
If you’re dehydrated this will mangle your motivation, mood and focus.
Try and always have water within your grasp and the H2O will help you stay on top of your tasks.
11. Hit the Sauna
I find that after a relaxing sauna session I have an unparalleled clarity of mind.
The sauna causes your pores to open and the enables toxins to escape from your largest organ, your skin.
The sauna relaxes your muscles and relieves mind-clouding tension.
Shortly after I bought a new lock for my gym locker I forgot the combination. Rather than heading to the front desk to get them to chop it off I hit the sauna.
As soon as I got out of the shower, toweled off, and came back to my locker I unlocked it on my first try.
12. Outsource More
With effective outsourcing you can make more money by focusing your efforts on what drives results while someone else tackles a task that they specialize in.
I recommend hiring an employee from the Phillipines.
Some of the most popular outsourcing websites are: Elance.com, Scriptlance.com, VWorker.com, Freelancer.com, Guru.com, and oDesk.com.
If you are outsourcing your design work a cool service to use is 99designs.
99designs is the #1 marketplace for crowdsourced graphic design. They connect passionate designers from around the globe with customers seeking quality, affordable design services. 99designs is exceptional because it gives you many choices for the design project you post so you will almost certainly get connected with an awesome design that you love.
13. Stay Motivated
Celebrate when you achieve your goals.
Make time for exercise, friends and fun.
Keep the reasons why you work hard in mind and these will make the work not seem so bad. Having a desktop wallpaper to remind you of your motivators is a good way to stay focused on doing what it takes to get them.
My computer desktop has pictures of some of the cars I plan to own and the places I plan to visit.
Conclusion
Focus has driven some of the greatest innovations of our age.
It is clearly an important factor in Facebook founder Mark Zukerberg’s life, just check out this recent picture he took of his desk:
It’s important to focus on what you do best and partner with others who have invested countless hours into their own areas of expertise.
About Garin Kilpatrick
+Garin Kilpatrick is a writer, marketing and social media strategist, technology enthusiast, and internet entrepreneur.
