Your Life. Your Time. Your Attention

Your Life. Your Time. Your Attention
photography - tomas anthony

What is success if it does not include laughing often, loving much, appreciating beauty, finding the best in others, and giving oneself?


- To marvel at the smallest blade of grass, feel the wind on your skin, and notice your dog's loving eyes?


Take back control of your attention.


Notice if and how you've unknowingly given your time away to things you don't value and information that serves to profit others.


Develop a daily practice of awareness.


I am not talking about another productivity hack or method.


We need to discuss this honestly.   Productivity will only get you more stuff in cute little technological boxes.


In my experience, to bring health and joy into your everyday life, there are three areas to focus on:


- Your Body:

Movement is primary, proper fuel(nutrition: primarily plants), and recovery (sleep, kinetic chain maintenance)...


- Your Mind:

Developing your ability to focus your attention, develop awareness (emotionally and intellectually), personalized algorithms (systems & environments) on top of our existing neurobiological hardcoded ones - (whether this be simple habits or complex skill-based routines for success, or even creating space(s) that offer solitude, calm, distraction-free working and playing environments)


- Your Joy:

All of the things mentioned above are worthless if your life is devoid of Joy - or what I think of as Play.  As animals, we learn to be our best through Play, repeated actions bring us "flow: optimal experience" and leave us feeling closer to ourselves and others.


I believe the next step in human development is to design, develop, and implement customized strategies to build Digital Resilience:  - Robust, holistic methodologies that protect your attention, time, and are driven by your values.


But first, you must know where you are - how deep a hole have you dug yourself?


How much "attention debt" do you have?


Is your addiction so bad that you cannot go a day?

a week? Or even a month?


Everyone has heard of intermittent fasting regarding food - for our bodies, right?


- What about our minds?


Break your addiction to dopamine hits - by turning everything NOT essential OFF - I mean everything - for a day or multiple days.


If this seems impossible, ask yourself the following questions:

If your job is in knowledge work -


- Do you feel like your mind (life) has been hijacked or infected with distracting attention-sucking purpose-built algorithms leveraging your biology for profit?


Do you chastise yourself for spending hours on TikTok, Instagram, or other sites?


Are you endlessly responding to external requests - likes, emails, shares, etc.?


Was there ever a time when you felt technology served you more than you it?


We build the machines.   And although we have limited free will, we can create positive reinforcing environments and conditions to flourish.


The first step is to begin to take back control of your mind.


Build your algorithms(systems and operating environments: both figuratively and even literally) to harness the power you have to control your attention.


Bring awareness to everything you are, and do.