Pay Attention

"Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are."
Jose Ortega y Gasset

How often have you heard these words used together? “Pay attention.” “I was really paying attention.” “You better pay attention!” This led me to ask myself, “How am I spending my attention?”

Wow, attention as a commodity? I’ve often heard the exhortation that my time is valuable. This is the first time I’ve clearly considered my attention as a kind of currency. When I “pay attention” I’m exchanging my attention-currency for … what? What goods or services am I purchasing with my attention? How am I spending my attention?

"Only when your consciousness is totally focused on the moment you are in can you receive whatever gift, lesson or delight that moment has to offer." Barbara De Angelis

An aspect of this de-cluttering process just keeps knocking on the door of my heart and mind: the analogy between my home and my soul. Clutter is not only physical, like all the stuff I accumulate and save and hoard. Clutter is mental and emotional as well.

“Only one thing has to change for us to know happiness in our lives: where we focus our attention.” Greg Anderson

In my art studio (a.k.a. “The Crap Room”) it is not uncommon for me to have to step over and around piles and piles of stuff. I have actually tripped a few times and I thought, “Great. The paper will read ‘death by crap’.” I would go into the room just to find something specific and get out. Or, I would go into the room to dump something else. I would purposely “try not to look.” What a joke! How could I not look at it? It is everywhere! Nevertheless, I tried not to see it. I didn’t want to pay attention to it.

What piles and piles of stuff and junk and crap in my head and my heart am I picking my way through? What am I trying not to see? If I see this stuff then I am faced with the choice to do something about it or not. Am I avoiding paying attention because then I will have to take responsibility? Ouch.

"I don't care how much power, brilliance or energy you have, if you don't harness it and focus it on a specific target, and hold it there you're never going to accomplish as much as your ability warrants." Zig Ziglar

When I am in the organization process I will go through all my stuff and choose what to keep and what to let go. Part of the inner-organization process is the willingness to look at my inner stuff and decide what value, if any, it has for me; whether it is useful or not. Is it for me now or is it something from the past that I don’t need to hold onto?

“Big Brother isn’t watching. He’s singing and dancing. He’s pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother’s busy holding your attention every moment you’re awake. He’s making sure you’re always distracted. He’s making sure you’re fully absorbed.” Chuck Palahniuk

How am I cluttering my mind? Where are my thoughts? What am I thinking about? What thoughts am I paying attention to? What thoughts am I spending my attention on? I am bombarded from all sides with messages and suggestions and information. Technology alone can feed so much into my mind that there is little room for anything else in there. And, let’s face it; my own head supplies a constant chatter of its own. Will I pay attention to the thought, “I’ll never change”? Or will I spend my attention on the thought, “I will be free”?

"Attitude is the way you mentally look at the world around you. It is how you view your environment and your future. It is the focus you develop toward life itself."

How am I cluttering my emotions? Am I spending attention on bitterness, resentment, anger, insecurity? If I pay attention to bitterness, what am I buying? What am I getting for my money? What would happen if I spend more attention on forgiveness than I do on holding a grudge? What would I receive in return for such a payment?

Am I spending so much attention on molehills that my store of attention is depleted when I am faced with the mountains?

"In solitude we give passionate attention to our lives, to our memories, to the details around us." Virginia Woolf

How can I give "passionate attention" to my life? How can I invest my attention-currency wisely? What can I do to grow my attention account? Am I spending my attention-allowance as fast as I get it; like a kid in a candy store? I want to conserve my attention, saving it and spending it more purposefully on what is most meaningful.

"Genius is nothing but continued attention." Claude Adrien Helvetius

If I pay attention to one direction/thing does that bankrupt my ability to pay attention to others?

“Bad memory has its roots in bad attention.”

Is my attention a limited resource? Do I clutter my life with less-than-fruitful pursuits/thoughts/people to the point where I have no energy for more valuable focus? For example, if I spend a couple hours “surfing the net” it is quite difficult to pay attention to a good book. Maybe it is because I have spent my attention-currency somewhere else and my attention account is depleted. You could try it and see if you notice the same thing.

"Give whatever you are doing and whoever you are with the gift of your attention." Jim Rohn.

Who do you give "gift of attention?" I suspect we have each experienced what I would call “toxic people.” I want to spend my attention on people who are uplifting and who deposit wonderful encouragement, love and wisdom into my heart/mind account. I want to pay attention to relationships that are most meaningful. It is good to sort through the relationships in my life and notice which are to be nurtured and which are to be released. Sometimes even “good people” can divide the attention I pay to my husband, children, close friends, etc.

"One half of knowing what you want is knowing what you must give up before you get it." Sidney Howard

What has your “undivided attention”? For years I’ve felt that I’m missing what’s most important in the mess of stuff that is okay or good. I know that I have items that are meaningful to me lost in all the other stuff. “The good is the enemy of the best.” I have lots of good stuff; but it is choking out the best. The more stuff I keep, the less I’m able to actually use. When I keep everything it can all come to mean less; if for no other reason than I simply cannot pay attention to all those things. I end up with NSF on my attention account. My attention is not only divided, it is fractured!

"The purpose of life is not to be happy - but to matter, to be productive, to be useful, to have it make some difference that you have lived at all." Leo Rosten

"Past the seeker as he prayed came the crippled and the beggar and the beaten. And seeing them... he cried, "Great God, how is it that a loving creator can see such things and yet do nothing about them?" God said, "I did do something. I made you." Author Unknown

Do you believe that you are here for a reason? Do you believe that there is a purpose for your life? I believe that I am not here by accident. I believe that God has a purpose for me. I believe that Spirit has planted within me passionate focus. I can spend my attention on all kinds of “good” things; but they will deplete my resources and my ability to go after what I’m most passionate about. There will be so much going on and I will be spread so thin that I’ll not able to fully experience even what is okay or good, let alone the best.

“You can become blind by seeing each day as a similar one. Each day is a different one, each day brings a miracle of its own. It’s just a matter of paying attention to this miracle.” Paulo Coelho

I choose a different way. I choose to look at my stuff – mental, emotional and physical – and discard what no longer works, what is from the past, what doesn’t feed my spirit. I choose to spend my attention on the purpose God has for me; I choose to spend my attention following the passion placed in my heart by Spirit.

I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back. Philippians 3:12-14 (The Message)