71 Quotes On Maintaining Focus

In a world brimming with distractions, maintaining focus can often feel like a superpower. Whether you're working towards personal goals, navigating professional challenges, or simply aiming to live more mindfully, the ability to concentrate on what truly matters is essential. Harnessing the wisdom of those who have mastered this art can inspire and guide us on our own journeys. Our curated collection of 71 quotes offers insights from thinkers, leaders, and visionaries across various fields, each sharing their unique perspective on the importance of focus. Let these words motivate you to sharpen your concentration and drive, keeping you on the path to success and fulfillment.

1. “Very occasionally, if you pay really close attention, life doesn't suck.” - Joss Whedon

2. “It took greater energy to be able to focus when heardthe voice of wisdom in a hustle bustle than in serenity.” - Toba Beta

3. “...you cannot eat every tadpole and frog in the pond, but you can eat the biggest and ugliest one, and that will be enough, at least for the time being.” - Brian Tracy

4. “He well knew his mind's natural tendency to be endlessly on a thousand subjects at once, to flit from this to that and to the next thing to no particular purpose--indeed, he called it his "butterfly mind.” - Eric Metaxas

5. “You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don't do too many things wrong.” - Warren Buffett

6. “Inspiration is the windfall from hard work and focus. Muses are too unreliable to keep on the payroll.” - Helen Hanson

7. “I guess we speak pretty loosely, don't we, about looking forward to the Ashes and all that—and we are, but it's not with both eyes. We've got one eye on that and one eye on what we need to get in place to make sure we're the best team we can be for November.” - Ricky Ponting

8. “Once out of your cradle, you don't focus on the world in the abstract, perceiving things for the first time, but in synchrony with your accumulated knowledge, which enriches and helps define your experience, as well as ensuring its uniqueness.” - Winifred Gallagher

9. “Horse Frightened by a Lion depicts a majestic stallion in a very different situation. Stubbs painted this magnetic masterpiece to illustrate the nature of the sublime, which was one of his era's most popular philosophical concepts,and its relation to a timelessly riveting feeling: fear. The magnificent horse galloping through a vast wilderness encounters the bottom-up stimulus of a crouching predator and responds with a dramatic display of what psychologists mildly call "negative emotion." The equine superstar's arched neck, dilated eyes, and flared nostrils are in fact the very picture of overwhelming dread. The painting's subject matter reflects he philosopher Edmund Burke's widely circulated Philosophical Enquiry into the Origins of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, which asserts that because "terror" is unparalleled in commanding "astonishment," or total, single-pointed,--indeed, rapt--attention, it is "the ruling principle of the sublime.” - Winifred Gallagher

10. “Consciousness, which is the "reflective" element of Norman's conceptual brain, handles the "higher" functions at the metaphorical tip of the very top of that complicated organ. Because consciousness pays a lot of attention to your thoughts, you tend to identify it with cognition. However, if you try to figure out exactly how you run your business or care for your family, you soon realize that you can't grasp that process just by thinking about it. As Norman puts it, "Consciousness also has a qualitative, sensory feel. If I say, 'I'm afraid,' it's not just my mind talking. My stomach also knots up.” - Winifred Gallagher

11. “Debriefing-style counseling after a trauma often aggravates a victim's stress-related symptoms, for example, and 4 in 10 bereaved people do better without grief therapy.” - Winifred Gallagher

12. “Research shows that when they confront a potentially unpleasant situation, such as some unfriendly faces at a gathering, these extraverts are apt to shift their attention rapidly around the room and zero in on amiable or neutral visages, thus short-circuiting the distressing images before they can get stored in memory.” - Winifred Gallagher

13. “Where visual artists are concerned, the Baroque sculptor and architect Bernini and the painter and sculptor Picasso were clearly adept at both experiential and instrumental attending, says Tellegen, as is the modern architect Frank Gehry. Choosing a literary example, he says that F. Scott Fitzgerald once admitted to "wrapping one of his romantic flings in cellophane" for later artistic use and notes that "this kind of heartless but honest professionalism is not uncommon among creative people.” - Winifred Gallagher

14. “In a variation on James's recipe for interesting experience--the familiar leavened by the novel--Hobbs's "art of choosing difficulties" requires selecting projects that are "just manageable." If an activity is too easy, you lose focus and get bored. If it's too hard, you become anxious, overwhelmed, and unable to concentrate. Tellingly, one group is distinguished by its zeal for the kind of work that requires you to give it all you've got: high achievers particularly relish taking on risky projects that have only a 50/50 chance of success.” - Winifred Gallagher

15. “Over time, a commitment to challenging, focused work and leisure produces not only better daily experience, but also a more complex, interesting person: the long-range benefit of the focused life. As Hobbs put it, the secret of fulfillment is "to choose trouble for oneself in the direction of what one would like to become.” - Winifred Gallagher

16. “After he wrote The Paradox of Choice, Schwartz got fervent amens from European governments as well as individual readers for insisting that the management of your focus has become one of decision-laden modernity's major challenges. Many behavioral economists and social psychologists also share his concern about what he calls "the consequences of mis-attention.” - Winifred Gallagher

17. “If you really want to focus on something, says Castellanos, the optimum amount of time to spend on it is ninety minutes. "Then change tasks. And watch out for interruptions once you're really concentrating, because it will take you twenty minutes to recover.” - Winifred Gallagher

18. “The more choices we have, the greater the need for focus.” - Tom Butler-Bowdon

19. “Michael wasn't on the pool deck, which was hard for me. None of my old Coral Springs teammates were around. Still, that old plane of cement felt like home. I folded my clothes and put them on the bench. I placed my water bottle under my starting block, and I dove in. Once again, I felt that ultimate state of transition, my feet no longer on the ground, my hands not yet in the water.” - Dara Torres

20. “When you try to persistently abolish hatred,at that very moment...you lose focus on love.” - Toba Beta

21. “Focusing is about saying No.” - Steve Jobs

22. “Find your focus by seeking all that is good in your life.” - Lorii Myers

23. “He said focus. The word focus. I hear angels singing. Everything goes dark except for a light that beams down on Sean. It is a God-given sign- like when people see the Virgin Mary in their grilled cheese, except this isn't religious and I'm actually not a big fan of dairy. I stare at the back of his head. His HEAD. Something I see every day but never really see because it's been there forever. Since the first day of third grade.I crumple up my web. I don't need it. Praise be, the Focus Gods have spoken.I am going to write about Sean Griswold's Head.” - Lindsey Leavitt

24. “I don't spend a lot of time asking "WHY?" Instead I focus on what I should do now or how I should react." (p.180)” - Jeff Dixon-The Key To The Kingdom

25. “Becoming wealthy is about accumulating wealth.” - Stephen Richards

26. “Be yourself and become wealthy!” - Stephen Richards

27. “Reality is a projection of your thoughts or the things you habitually think about.” - Stephen Richards

28. “What are the five products you want to focus on? Get rid of the rest, because they’re dragging you down. They’re turning you into Microsoft. They’re causing you to turn out products that are adequate but not great.” - Walter Isaacson

29. “No one but another painter could know the delicacy required to balance the complexities, to keep reality at bay in order to remain in the innermost center of his work.” - Susan Vreeland

30. “If you think you can then you can.” - Stephen Richards

31. “When your back is to the wall and you are facing fear head on, the only way is forward and through it.” - Stephen Richards

32. “When you fail, that is when you get closer to success.” - Stephen Richards

33. “Happiness is something we reap from the seeds we sow. Plant misery seeds and that us what you reap.” - Stephen Richards

34. “While amidst the crowd and seeking quieteness in another zone you can still get away from them by homing in on matters within.” - Stephen Richards

35. “It occurred to Susan that men were always waiting for something cataclysmic--love or war or a giant asteroid. Every man wanted to be a hot-headed Bruce Willis character, fighting against the evil foreign enemy while despising the domestic bureaucracy. Men just wanted to focus on one big thing, leaving the thousands of smaller messes for the women around them to clean up.” - Bonnie Jo Campbell

36. “The whole concatenation of wild and artificial things, the natural ecosystem as modified by people over the centuries, the build environment layered over layers, the eerie mix of sounds and smells and glimpses neither natural nor crafted- all of it is free for the taking, for the taking in. Take it, take it in, take in more every weekend, every day, and quickly it becomes the theater that intrigues, relaxes, fascinates, seduces, and above all expands any mind focused on it. Outside lies utterly ordinary space open to any casual explorer willing to find the extraordinary. Outside lies unprogrammed awareness that at times becomes directed serendipity. Outside lies magic.” - John Stilgoe

37. “...on the job there was nothing but the job. You left the shit outside the door. You could always pick it up on your way back out.” - Laurell K. Hamilton

38. “No matter how small you start, always dream big.” - Stephen Richards

39. “It is not for me to judge another man's life. I must judge, I must choose, I must spurn, purely for myself. For myself, alone.” - Herman Hesse

40. “Information overload is a symptom of our desire to not focus on what's important. It is a choice.” - Brian Solis

41. “Everybody listens to me with a focus on my words. This is a mistake. The words are the vehicle to deliver an idea. Always listen to the idea, it's more valid then any words that I can use.” - Richard Diaz

42. “You must really want to win with all of your heart! Plan your race; do not ever get side tracked. Focus on your goal - “the finishing line”!” - Lucas Remmerswaal

43. “Listen for the call of your destiny, and when it comes, release your plans and follow.” - Mollie Marti

44. “When life gives you lemons, use Cosmic Ordering!” - Stephen Richards

45. “Cosmic Ordering is a dish best served today.” - Stephen Richards

46. “The first law of attraction is use Cosmic Ordering now.” - Stephen Richards

47. “On the road to success some will always expect tragedy ... ditch your doubts and experience success with Cosmic Ordering.” - Stephen Richards

48. “In the beginning man was poor, then along came Cosmic Ordering.” - Stephen Richards

49. “A clever person solves a problem; a wise person uses Cosmic Ordering!” - Stephen Richards

50. “The only secret of wealth creation is knowing how to use Cosmic Ordering.” - Stephen Richards

51. “Everybody talks about being rich, Cosmic Ordering does something about it.” - Stephen Richards

52. “A man may fail many times, and then he turns to Cosmic Ordering.” - Stephen Richards

53. “Often the only difference between success and failure is not using Cosmic Ordering.” - Stephen Richards

54. “The universe is full of magical things to be manifested with Cosmic Ordering.” - Stephen Richards

55. “Create your own miracles, don't just wait for miracles to happen. Infinite possibilities exist by keeping focus on what you really want.” - Steven Redhead

56. “To make 2013 (or any other)your year, keep it simple:1) Count your blessings first2) Whatever you did last year, Do it better3) Go step by step, One day at a time.4) Create/make your own opportunities.5) Believe in your abilities at all times,6) Qutting is not an option. Keep Going.7) Finish what you started” - Pablo

57. “In order to pick something up, you've got to put something down.” - Todd Stocker

58. “We spend a lot of time trying to get more and more things, not realizing that those things can never fulfill us. Learn from those who have gone before you - stuff can never satisfy your desires, so focus on THE ONE who can.” - Osayi Osar-Emokpae

59. “Activities such as chanting, bowing, and sitting in zazen are not at all wasted, even when done merely formally, for even this superficial encounter with the Dharma will have some wholesome outcome at a later time. However, it must be said in the most unambiguous terms that this is not real Zen. To follow the Dharma involves a complete reorientation of one's life in such a way that one's activities are manifestations of, and are filled with, a deeper meaning. If it were not otherwise, and merely sitting in zazen were enough, every frog in the pond would be enlightened, as one Zen master said. Dōgen Zenji himself said that one must practice Zen with the attitude of a person trying to extinguish a fire in his hair. That is, Zen must be practiced with an attitude of single-minded urgency.” - Francis Harold Cook

60. “Harnessing the unique sex energy that can only arise through sexual expression can awaken multidimensional awareness and provide you with your desired goal.” - Stephen Richards

61. “You put yourself where you are, and if you find yourself unsatisfied with how you are, then get yourself out of it.” - Stephen Richards

62. “To control your life, control your mind. To control your mind, control your breath.” - Stephen Richards

63. “Focusing on what you don’t want instead of focusing on what do want gets you nowhere. Negativity makes a horrible motivator. Decide what you want and move in that direction.” - Steve Maraboli

64. “If you are in a prison of fear ... break out!” - Stephen Richards

65. “Yesterday's shortcuts are today's nightmares. The race is quicker when we're stricter. Keep your eyes on today, and declare what you may.” - Mark O'Brien

66. “Hungry people are always thinking about food; poor people are always thinking about wealth. Obsessive thinking can kill your dreams!” - Stephen Richards

67. “Long before they had ever met, I think this destiny awaited them. They were not like ships passing in the night. It wasn't like they didn't understand each other. They understood each other better than anyone else, and each was focused solely on the other.” - Gen Urobuchi

68. “Set aside your repertoire of objections and own 100 percent of your focus.” - Lorii Myers

69. “Don’t compromise your focus by comparing what you are trying to learn to what you already know. Focus in the moment, on what you are trying to learn now.” - Lorii Myers

70. “Run and hide or rise and shine ...” - Stephen Richards

71. “Positive thinking without any thought is wasted ...” - Stephen Richards