You Don’t Need to Keep Updated. You Just Need to Keep Focused.
Distractions are everywhere.
Notifications, phone calls, e-mails, commercials, social media, the news. Not to mention all the sounds and smells and sights. There are a thousand things to look at, and a thousand things to keep up with.
Despite its tempting nature, it is this need to keep up that will ultimately lead you to fall behind.
Updates are distractions.
The world is constantly changing.
Somewhere in the world, a rainstorm has started. Somewhere else, a new product has been launched by your favorite store. Somewhere not far away from you, your friend has posted a picture on their social media.
You can have access to all this information at any point in time. At any point in time, you can keep up with the world before it moves on without you. The only thing you need to do is click.
But every time you click, you become only momentarily satisfied. When everything moves so fast in the world, nothing stays relevant or interesting for long. Which means that every time you pull out your phone, you teach your brain to relish those small doses of relief or happiness — and you give it nothing more to sustain its interest.
Over time, you wind up tearing down your resistance. As with anyone who depends on instant gratification, you become more easily distracted in life; a single ping can turn your eyes to the screen. Your attention gets divided so easily, and spent so easily, that you lose the very thing you need to succeed.
You lose your focus.
Focus is the path to success.
By doing more, you achieve less.
Divided attention only turns into lost focus. You lose track of each course you take. Before long, you are standing at a fork in the road, with a million of possible paths but no ability to commit to any of them.
In order to move forward in life, whether in skill or personhood, you must pick a path to follow. You need to envision yourself a clear destination. And this destination can only be reached if you focus on your path to get there.
Knowledge comes from dedication to a topic, and mastery comes from dedication to a task. It is when you do more with much less that you make meaningful progress. Because when you do less with much more, you only thrive so long as the update lives.
You cannot keep up with everything in the world. But you can keep up with your own mission in life. You can commit to your values and goals, and you can give your undivided attention to the things that you want to spend your time and energy on; the things that give you actual meaning and purpose.
Even now, the world is changing.
You can choose to move on without it.
