Focus is about saying no

Hi frens,

Being laser-like focusing on a small set of projects is how Apple succeeded in the iPod and iPhone era. Steve Jobs stated multiple times that focusing is not about saying yes to the working project, but in practice saying no to a lot of other stuff.

In my early student life, I suffered a lot from managing too much stuff, and thus was forced to say no to many other loved ones. In our education, we have learned to cultivate interest, but not so much about how to manage our efforts to get satisfied results.

Jony Ive, the former iconic designer in Apple, elaborated that focusing strategy even more radically (starting at 1:27):

Steve was the most remarkably focused person I've ever met in my life... what focus means is saying no to something that you with every bone in your body, you think is a phenomenal idea, and you wake up thinking about it, but you say no to it because you're focusing on something else.

It sounds really exaggerating, isn’t it? At first, I thought it was simply a practical strategy to stay focused. Now I have another explanation: when we’re focusing on a project, there may still be some boring hands-on procedures or difficult problems that we’d like to escape from. So our brain gets distracted and comes up with some other interesting stuff. It is an illusion, or the devil that lures us.

So we have to stay focused by saying no to other stuff, repeatedly and relentlessly, without any excuses.

Your friend,

Denken