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Tom McHaffie tells a story that I want to start with today.

It’s about a group of very smart thieves who were robbing local stores.

But the reason that I want you to hear this story has NOTHING to do with protecting local stores from robberies. 

It has everything to do with a problem that’s much more personal and hits much closer to home.

In fact, if you feel overwhelmed or stagnant in your life right now, then you’ll especially want to read it.

I’ll explain more after you hear the story.

Here’s what MaHaffie says…

A former police officer tells of the tactics of roving bands of thieves: He says…

“They enter the store as a group. One or two separate themselves from the group, and the others start a loud commotion in another section of the store.

“This grabs the attention of the clerks and customers. As all eyes are turned to the disturbance, the accomplices fill their pockets with merchandise and cash, leaving before anyone suspects.

“Hours–sometimes even days–later, the victimized merchant realizes things are missing and calls the police. Too late.”

 

When I hear that story I think of three things:

1. That’s a pretty ingenious method that those thieves have come up with.
2. It’s too bad the clerks at these stores didn’t realize those seemingly innocent distractions were causing them to be robbed.
3. You and I need to realize that we have the same problem.

You see, I hate to tell you this, but you’ve also been robbed.

You didn’t realize it because of the commotion.

It distracted your attention.

And so you went right on, never realizing it had happened.

How have you been robbed?

• You have had opportunities that have been stolen away from you.
• You’ve been robbed from getting important work done.
• You’re life has been plundered and the solutions you could have come up with for some of your biggest problems are nowhere to be found.

Now obviously, I’m speaking metaphorically.

But don’t be fooled.

I am dead serious.

You’ve really been robbed.
(And what’s worse is that it’s still happening.)

Now, I have good news and bad news.

Let me start with the good news…

The Good News:

• You know the culprits.
• You’ll recognize them when I identify some of them to you.
• And you can handle them and stop this looting of your life from continuing.

But you will have to do it strategically.

And you’ll have to use a method you probably haven’t tried before.

Or they’ll be back to rob you again.

The Bad News:

• There is more than one of them.
• Some of them are very good at distracting you, so you can be robbed.
• And some are very subtle in their attacks.

If you don’t do anything, you’ll keep being robbed.

And you won’t realize the real ramifications of all that you’ve lost, until it’s too late to get some of the things back.

A Few of the Culprits in Your Life

So you’re probably wondering… “Who are the thieves?”

Here are they are:

• Your “To Do” list
• The TV
• Your Smartphone
• *Your co-workers
• *Your friends 

*I don’t mean to list either of these two groups as an insult to them. They do it unintentionally. Or they don’t do it at all, but we use them to allow ourselves to be robbed.

Anyway, I told you that you’d recognize them.

Now be careful.

Just knowing who they are isn’t enough.

They work as a team and they are very good at working together to cause a commotion that will distract just long enough to be mugged of what you’ve been searching for.

I’ll explain more about what I mean in just a minute, but first you have to realize more of what you’re really up against.

A World of Interruptions 

I’ve said this before, but it’s worth repeating.

We live in an age of increase.

Everything is bigger and better.

Except for one thing: our attention spans.

And it’s no wonder!

Microsoft did a study on how many interruptions we face every day.

The study was called A Diary Study of Task Switching and Interruptions (NOTE: Link goes to PDF).

This infographic below from Redeapp.com reveals some of their findings…

Too many things are pulling at us these days.

There are too many things to distract us.

Let’s be honest.

• It’s not a lack of opportunity that holds us back in most cases, it’s that many times we don’t see the opportunity that’s right in front of us.
• It’s not a lack of time that keeps us from getting our work done, it’s the fact that we can’t decide what’s the most important thing that we should be focused on.
  (It is a flaw in a business setting, but it’s “fatal” in our personal lives.)
• It’s not that the problems that we’re facing are insurmountable, it’s that we don’t have the time to think about them and come up with the solutions to these problems.

We all are so busy that we wish we had more time to see the opportunities, decide what’s important, and come up with more solutions to our problems.

It’s just that we can’t seem to find the time.

But what if your problem isn’t that you don’t have enough time?

Time Management is Not the Real Issue

You might not believe this, but hear me out…

Your main problem is NOT with time management.

Your main problem is with ATTENTION Management.

The tools, luxuries, and benefits of our modern lives – that were supposed to add to our lives – have ended up distracting us from the important things in life.

Three Valuable Things That Have Been Looted from Your Life

Theses things have become the thieves that swoop in, distract us, and rob us of three extremely valuable things in this busy world:

1. Opportunities
2. Accomplishments
3. Solutions

It’s not our time that we need to manage better.

It’s our attention.

When we manage our attention better, THEN we’ll manage our time better.

And that will allow us to get unstuck and advance in this world, while others slip behind or just stagnate.

As Og Mandino said, “It is those who concentrate on one thing at a time who advance in this world.”

Concentration Tip: If you need help concentrating on one thing, then you should consider this tip from LifeHack.org…

Trying to manage our time can seem overwhelming and complicated.

But managing our attention doesn’t have to be like that.

In fact, I’ve come across simple solution that will help any of us to become more focused, more effective, and more creative.

In fact, the interesting thing about this solution is this:

• It DOESN’T require more work or effort on your part. In fact, it requires less.
• It DOESN’T require you to memorize some new time management system. It can be easily remembered once you learn it.
• It DOES require you to do what the majority of our 24/7, non-stop world doesn’t do.

I’ll explain more about it later.

 

ATTENTION TIP: If there is something you want to focus on this week, then try this tip from 1000LifeHacks.com...

I want to end by talking to you about an important idea and then I want to invite you to watch a short video.

Why Some People Accomplish More Than You Do

The important idea I want to end with is this: Not all effort is equal. 

I heard a story about two men who were out hunting.

Neither of them were very good hunters, so they marched through the fields for hours seeing many rabbits, but never being able to hit even on.

Finally evening was approaching and they both were pretty tired.

It was at that moment when one of the guys turned to the other and said with a smirk on his face, “Hey Tom, what do you  think? Let’s just miss two more rabbits and call it a day.”

These two hunters spent as much effort and energy that day as it would take to get 20 rabbits.

But that effort produced zero actual kills.

It’s the same with many of us. 

We’re busy, we put in a lot of effort, but what results do we have to show for all of that busyness and work?

Effort is great, but results make all the difference.

If we can’t stop these roving thieves in our lives from robbing us, then our results will never change. 

The Four Kinds of Effort, Four Kinds of Results

There are four basic types of effort that produce four different results in our life.
(And only one of those is the life-changing kind of results.)

Most of us end up focusing on three of these these types of effort, but only a few focus on the fourth kind.

And those people who do, experience a different kind of results than the rest of us.

If you’d like to learn more about these three different types of effort and the three different results, then sign-up below and you can watch a video that I created for you that’s all about these thing.

This FREE Video Will Reveal

In this 19:27 minute video, you’ll discover:

• What we can learn about the type of effort we need to focus on from one of the most dominant players in American college basketball history
• What the four basic types are and why only two of them are the ones we should be focusing on, if we want to see new and better results
• The important truth we need to realize about our daily rituals
• 7 questions you need to ask yourself about your daily rituals
• 3 basic areas we should focus on, if we want to fight off the daily thieves and get new and better results
• And more

Plus by signing up, you’ll be the first to know about two other videos that I’ll be posting where you’ll learn more about how to get unstuck and get more done. 

They are a part of a 3-video series I’m calling, “The Dangers of a Busy Life”.

Here are some of the things I’ll share in these two other videos:

• The power of doing nothing
• Why we need to become “misers of moments”
• Why we also need to beware of the barrenness of a busy life
• The only antidote for interruption
• Why we need to move from amateur to artist when it comes to how we handle time
• And more

And through all of this, you’ll learn more about my simple solution that will help any of us to become more focused, more effective, and more creative and how you can begin using it in your life.

Photo by sloanpix