“What will your life have been, in the end, but the sum total of everything you spent it focusing on?” —Oliver Burkeman
Don’t drop the ball…
It seems that as we continue to get older, and as the world becomes more complex, there is a never ending stream of things to get done. At work you have to do more with less. At home things break requiring time. People need more attention, and the to-do list grows to epic proportions.
We never have enough time to do the things we want. At best we manage to juggle, barely keeping all of the balls in the air. At worst they come crashing down, maybe one by one, maybe all at one time.
Is that what you feel right now? Do you have too many balls in the air? Is it becoming difficult to discern the glass balls (high priority, high risk) from the rubber ones (low priority, or low risk)?
As the juggling becomes increasingly frantic, you are more likely to begin dropping the ball.
The Truth
Here is the truth. We are all juggling multiple balls at the same time. Technology has made it so our minds are constantly being bombarded with new tasks, more things to get done, and more decisions to make. Inevitably, we will exceed our capacity to keep every ball airborne. What possibly can be done?
Let’s break the process of juggling down.
You have a ball in the hand. You toss it back up in the air. Now that it is airborne, you have no control over where it goes. If you threw it well, it should come right back down, hopefully aimed at one of your hands. If not, you will have to position your body and your hand such that you can catch it when it comes back down. While it is airborne, you must keep your eye on the ball. The second you fail to pay attention to that ball, you risk dropping it. Once the ball is dropped, it is down. If the ball is down, you have to stop juggling all of the other balls to pick it up. A rubber will bounce around for a while, no big deal. But if it is glass, most likely it is shattered and will require time to clean it up.
Naturally, the more balls you are simultaneously juggling, the more difficult it is to pay attention to any one ball flying in the air. With the constant bombardment of information, tasks, emails, and projects to do, it seems there is a circus clown with a giant bucket of balls throwing them at you. All of those flying rubber and glass balls require attention. As the clown, named “Life”, keeps throwing things at you, there are decisions to make.
“Does this incoming ball require my attention?”
If the incoming ball is glass—high priority, high risk—maybe you need to let one of the rubber balls go.
The Risks
With every decision, there is risk on either side of the equation. In this case the risk lies primarily with your time and attention.
Each instance you make the decision to catch an incoming ball (task, project, social commitment, etc), you begin to put every other airborne ball at risk. The more time and attention you commit, the less you have to allocate to the airborne rubber and glass balls.
On the contrary, each time you decide to let an incoming ball go, you risk losing out on an opportunity. You are trading away the new for the old.
In many cases letting a new opportunity go while doubling down on a current endeavor is the right thing to do.
But how do you know you are making the right decision every time?
This comes down to your vision and your values. If you run each decision you make in life through your vision and values, you will seldom stray.
The Green Ball
To give an example of what this looks like, consider my German Shepherd Dog Sadie. There is one thing you need to know about Sadie: she reveres her tennis ball above any other object or person in the world. Given the choice between breakfast and her ball, she will choose the ball every time.
When we go out to the field to ‘play ball’, for her, everything else disappears. She is laser focused on the bright green ball, and nothing can distract her. When I have the ball in hand, she sits in front of me, staring intently at my hand and arm in an effort to anticipate the direction I will throw it next. Then, once it is airborne, a sudden burst of energy carries her at lightning speed towards the ball. She never looks back. After she has the initial vector of the ball, she puts her head down and runs as fast as she can.
It matters not if there is another dog running around. It matters not that I have a dog treat in my other hand. There could be another tennis ball laying on the ground and she would not notice. She is 100% focused on one thing. Her entire attention is on that airborne ball. If I throw a second tennis ball, she wouldn’t even notice, because she has one focus.
When was the last time you were so focused on the object of your interest, that you paid no attention to the distractions that rose up all around you?
The Challenge
I have two challenges for you:
1 – As you are focusing on catching the next falling or incoming ball, consider if it is worth the effort and attention. Does it fit within your core vision and values? If it is a rubber ball, and it is not urgent or important, let it bounce. If it is not inline with your vision and values, definitely let it bounce. Focus on the glass balls.
2 – When you have a ball in your hand, before launching it back up into the air, take an extra two seconds to think intentionally about what you do with it. Should you toss it back into the air right now or can you place it specifically to set yourself up for success next time you come across it.
Get after it. Live on purpose.
