vision. Only talk about what your focus is. You may not be in the position of a free-lance artist who can eat, breathe and sleep his art -- yet. Start with small steps. Block out a time each day to focus on The Main Thing. If your most productive, most creative time is first thing in the morning, spend your first two hours of the day on The Main Thing that will help you achieve your most important goal. No checking email or phone messages first. You’d be surprised how many things can wait two hours -- but would consume those two hours if you acknowledged them first. Don’t let the urgent push the important to the back burner.

3. Work hard for refinement.

The iPod was a wonderful invention and breakthrough for listening to music like never before. It is a social p

Athletes call it being in the zone. Mike Tyson had it early in his professional career. Tiger Woods demonstrated it in 2000 with unprecedented golf success. Actors talk of actually becoming the role they are playing, and they earn Oscars for those performances.

One business executive described it to me as being monomaniacal: When your entire focus remains on perfecting one thing. It is the pursuit of great performers looking to reach the next level.

What is “It?” It is clarity of thought paired with seamless action, and it is a recipe for unparalleled success. Imagine during your workday you are totally focused on being successful. No needless meetings, no non-work-related distractions, no interruptions -- just pure focus. How much more could you get done? How much more successful would you be in your job? What if everyone in your department operated in the same way? Sound like science fiction? It doesn’t have to be.

Congruency in motion and emotion is the purest cause of great success.

How many of us are even capable of this?

Watch children play. Take away the video games, turn off the television, let them have boundless play, and watch congruency in action. My nephew is able to turn most anything in his hands into the controls of heavy machinery and the rest of the world is lost to where he is and what he has created. His mental focus and his physical actions are completely in sync. In fact, most children are capable of this kind of congruency when not cluttered with external stimuli that block this type of thinking or provide the thinking for you.

As adults, we need to understand that our energy flows where our attention goes. If financial concerns, health issues, and negative information received through such channels as televised news or reports from the head office distract us, we are taken out of our congruency and we become scattered in our thinking and our efforts.

Am I saying to ignore these other issues? No. I am saying you must get these other things in order so that you can focus on the important. If you don’t take care of your health, for example, you will have reduced concentration, higher stress and less endurance. So taking care of your health becomes a prerequisite for creating an environment that facilitates congruency.

What environment can I create that will help me be more congruent?

1. Enjoy what you do.

If you aren’t tremendously happy at what you do, it is impossible to be resoundingly successful at it. Sometimes that means you must change jobs; other times it means you must keep in mind the deeper meaning of your job. For example, let’s say you’re a sales representative. If you get focused on the paperwork and the inevitable rejections and frustrations of the sales process, it is harder to enjoy what you do. If you keep your eye on the main goal of your job -- making sure your customers have the proper materials to do their important tasks and to provide for your family -- then you can find deep satisfaction.

2. Create opportunity for uninterrupted focus.

Ignore the newspaper and the television. Only talk about what your focus is. You may not be in the position of a free-lance artist who can eat, breathe and sleep his art -- yet. Start with small steps. Block out a time each day to focus on The Main Thing. If your most productive, most creative time is first thing in the morning, spend your first two hours of the day on The Main Thing that will help you achieve your most important goal. No checking email or phone messages first. You’d be surprised how many things can wait two hours -- but would consume those two hours if you acknowledged them first. Don’t let the urgent push the important to the back burner.

3. Work hard for refinement.

The iPod was a wonderful invention and breakthrough for listening to music like never before. It is a social p

h more successful would you be in your job? What if everyone in your department operated in the same way? Sound like science fiction? It doesn’t have to be.

Congruency in motion and emotion is the purest cause of great success.

How many of us are even capable of this?

Watch children play. Take away the video games, turn off the television, let them have boundless play, and watch congruency in action. My nephew is able to turn most anything in his hands into the controls of heavy machinery and the rest of the world is lost to where he is and what he has created. His mental focus and his physical actions are completely in sync. In fact, most children are capable of this kind of congruency when not cluttered with external stimuli that block this type of thinking or provide the thinking for you.

As adults, we need to understand that our energy flows where our attention goes. If financial concerns, health issues, and negative information received through such channels as televised news or reports from the head office distract us, we are taken out of our congruency and we become scattered in our thinking and our efforts.

Am I saying to ignore these other issues? No. I am saying you must get these other things in order so that you can focus on the important. If you don’t take care of your health, for example, you will have reduced concentration, higher stress and less endurance. So taking care of your health becomes a prerequisite for creating an environment that facilitates congruency.

What environment can I create that will help me be more congruent?

1. Enjoy what you do.

If you aren’t tremendously happy at what you do, it is impossible to be resoundingly successful at it. Sometimes that means you must change jobs; other times it means you must keep in mind the deeper meaning of your job. For example, let’s say you’re a sales representative. If you get focused on the paperwork and the inevitable rejections and frustrations of the sales process, it is harder to enjoy what you do. If you keep your eye on the main goal of your job -- making sure your customers have the proper materials to do their important tasks and to provide for your family -- then you can find deep satisfaction.

2. Create opportunity for uninterrupted focus.

Ignore the newspaper and the television. Only talk about what your focus is. You may not be in the position of a free-lance artist who can eat, breathe and sleep his art -- yet. Start with small steps. Block out a time each day to focus on The Main Thing. If your most productive, most creative time is first thing in the morning, spend your first two hours of the day on The Main Thing that will help you achieve your most important goal. No checking email or phone messages first. You’d be surprised how many things can wait two hours -- but would consume those two hours if you acknowledged them first. Don’t let the urgent push the important to the back burner.

3. Work hard for refinement.

The iPod was a wonderful invention and breakthrough for listening to music like never before. It is a social p

g or provide the thinking for you.

As adults, we need to understand that our energy flows where our attention goes. If financial concerns, health issues, and negative information received through such channels as televised news or reports from the head office distract us, we are taken out of our congruency and we become scattered in our thinking and our efforts.

Am I saying to ignore these other issues? No. I am saying you must get these other things in order so that you can focus on the important. If you don’t take care of your health, for example, you will have reduced concentration, higher stress and less endurance. So taking care of your health becomes a prerequisite for creating an environment that facilitates congruency.

What environment can I create that will help me be more congruent?

1. Enjoy what you do.

If you aren’t tremendously happy at what you do, it is impossible to be resoundingly successful at it. Sometimes that means you must change jobs; other times it means you must keep in mind the deeper meaning of your job. For example, let’s say you’re a sales representative. If you get focused on the paperwork and the inevitable rejections and frustrations of the sales process, it is harder to enjoy what you do. If you keep your eye on the main goal of your job -- making sure your customers have the proper materials to do their important tasks and to provide for your family -- then you can find deep satisfaction.

2. Create opportunity for uninterrupted focus.

Ignore the newspaper and the television. Only talk about what your focus is. You may not be in the position of a free-lance artist who can eat, breathe and sleep his art -- yet. Start with small steps. Block out a time each day to focus on The Main Thing. If your most productive, most creative time is first thing in the morning, spend your first two hours of the day on The Main Thing that will help you achieve your most important goal. No checking email or phone messages first. You’d be surprised how many things can wait two hours -- but would consume those two hours if you acknowledged them first. Don’t let the urgent push the important to the back burner.

3. Work hard for refinement.

The iPod was a wonderful invention and breakthrough for listening to music like never before. It is a social p

hat will help me be more congruent?

1. Enjoy what you do.

If you aren’t tremendously happy at what you do, it is impossible to be resoundingly successful at it. Sometimes that means you must change jobs; other times it means you must keep in mind the deeper meaning of your job. For example, let’s say you’re a sales representative. If you get focused on the paperwork and the inevitable rejections and frustrations of the sales process, it is harder to enjoy what you do. If you keep your eye on the main goal of your job -- making sure your customers have the proper materials to do their important tasks and to provide for your family -- then you can find deep satisfaction.

2. Create opportunity for uninterrupted focus.

Ignore the newspaper and the television. Only talk about what your focus is. You may not be in the position of a free-lance artist who can eat, breathe and sleep his art -- yet. Start with small steps. Block out a time each day to focus on The Main Thing. If your most productive, most creative time is first thing in the morning, spend your first two hours of the day on The Main Thing that will help you achieve your most important goal. No checking email or phone messages first. You’d be surprised how many things can wait two hours -- but would consume those two hours if you acknowledged them first. Don’t let the urgent push the important to the back burner.

3. Work hard for refinement.

The iPod was a wonderful invention and breakthrough for listening to music like never before. It is a social p

vision. Only talk about what your focus is. You may not be in the position of a free-lance artist who can eat, breathe and sleep his art -- yet. Start with small steps. Block out a time each day to focus on The Main Thing. If your most productive, most creative time is first thing in the morning, spend your first two hours of the day on The Main Thing that will help you achieve your most important goal. No checking email or phone messages first. You’d be surprised how many things can wait two hours -- but would consume those two hours if you acknowledged them first. Don’t let the urgent push the important to the back burner.

3. Work hard for refinement.

The iPod was a wonderful invention and breakthrough for listening to music like never before. It is a social phenomenon, yet its creators still are constantly refining and in search of the perfect product. When you work hard to refine, not only do you improve whatever it is you are working on, but you also improve the thought process that will take you to a higher level of success. What was “good enough” last year that you no longer see as “good enough”? If you are congruent in your thinking and focus, you will constantly be seeking and finding refinement and improvement.

Great successes are constantly looking to maintain congruency of thought and action to the point they can turn it on when they need to. Warren Buffet doesn’t just happen to be one of the luckiest business leaders in the world. His success is predicated on his clarity of thought and purpose of action that in congruency delivers unprecedented success, which is what makes him the Oracle of Omaha.

What is your Main Thing? What is the one thing that you need to focus all your efforts in pursuit of? Let today be the day you find your clarity of thought and start aligning all your thoughts and actions to achieve a higher level of success.