What You Focus on Expands

What you focus on expands. I’m sure you’ve heard that a million times but it’s not a bunch of new age mumbo jumbo.

Your reticular activating system (RAS) is your brain’s attention center. When you focus on something for extended periods of time, you’re teaching that part of your brain that you need to see more of it.

So, let’s say one of your favorite phrases is Life Sucks. You say it so often you don’t even notice anymore.

And let’s say your life really does suck. Your boss is an idiot. Your ex is an asshole. Your kids decided they don’t want to live with you anymore. Instead, they want to live with the asshole ex. The side gig you’re trying to get off the ground so you don’t have to deal with the idiot boss is going nowhere…even though your copy rocks, you’re doing everything your business coach is telling you to do and you have the passion and drive to make it happen….and now, your freaking car just broke down meaning you’re going to be late for an important meeting-giving your idiot boss, even more, reason to bug the shit out of you.

You get the picture.

Your natural inclination is to complain. And really, who could blame you? Look at all this shit you gotta deal with.

But here’s the thing. The more you complain…the more you’re focusing on the shit. The more you focus on the shit, the more messages you’re sending to your RAS that focusing on shit is important. If your RAS is trained to see shit as important, it’s going to be on alert for more of it. That means it’s going to look for more reasons to show you how shitty your life is.

And that’s simply not a great way to go through life.

There is another way.

Look, I’m not suggesting you become a Pollyanna and pretend you don’t have problems.

What I am suggesting is for you to look at and deal with each problem as needed. You don’t have to like them. You can acknowledge they suck. But take whatever actions you can to fix them and don’t complain about them.

Btw, talking about your problems and what’s wrong and who’s an idiot incessantly is not sharing your point of view. It’s complaining.

Instead, look for the gifts in your life. Granted, they may not be huge right now and they may be hard to find…but you can find them if you want to.

It’s about retraining you and your RAS to notice these things.

Let’s get back to your car. You’re outside waiting for AAA and you notice a momma deer and her babies grazing on your lawn. You can ignore it or you stop and really enjoy the moment which feeds your RAS new information about what’s important to you.

Your kids moved in the asshole ex. You’re pissed and you’re heartbroken. You can focus on that or you can focus on the fact that they are alive, safe, and have a roof over their heads.

These small, seemingly small and inconsequential gifts will start to add up. The more you learn to focus on them, the more you’ll change what you automatically focus on…and that will not only make huge changes in the way you experience life, it will also change the course of your life.

Shit can happen but you’ll have the mental and emotional resources you need to deal with it because you’ve trained your brain to see the stuff that feeds your soul instead of the stuff that steals your soul and feeds your fear.

What you focus on expands. Choose your focus wisely.

Much love and abundant blessings,

The Emotional Demon Slayer