If there is any quality that will enable you achieve peak performance in anything you do, it is presence. I’ve talked about before about the power of being present. But I think it’s a subject worth revisiting.
Presence in the Working World
When I asked a senior executive at Intuit what the key was to getting ahead in your career, she said presence. It didn’t make sense at the time, but it does now. If you are so concerned with getting ahead or the future, then you are not doing your best work in the current moment. When you can singularly focus on what you have been currently assigned to work on, the quality of your work is going to be exponentially better than if you are focused on how what you are working on now will impact your future. When you are singularly focused all your efforts and resources are dedicated the present, hence the reason you achieve peak performance.
Presence in Other Areas of Your Life
In a conversation, relationship or any kind of interaction with another person, presence will make a huge difference in how you come across. I’ve by no means mastered this, but I realized the other day when I was surfing that even the slightest thought about something other than the wave that I was riding at the moment would result in a wipeout. If I was laser focused, which it’s almost impossible not to be when you are surfing, the ride was much smoother.
The challenge is that presence is not really essential to many areas of our lives. It’s possible to be having a conversation with the person in front of you, and have your mind be somewhere else. Presence in many areas requires effort. But by reminding ourselves that the only thing that matters in this moment is the very thing I’m doing, we can eventually move in a direction of complete presence.
Let go of concern for the future, the past or any other moment that is not now.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
SRINI YOU LEGEND!!
couldn’t agree more.
and i know it’s something that many a bearded wise man has pondered cross-legged in some cave on the mountain – but HOW does one become present?
Another interesting question is how you know when you are present?
inspiring deluxe.
stumbled.
hope your new years was magic.
a
Hi Srini,
I can’t imagine Babe Ruth, when swinging to hit a home run not being present. I can’t imagine Mozart not being present when he was composing a masterpiece. I think most, if not all people who achieved great things would have been present in the moment when it counted.
Gordie´s last blog ..Lifestyle Design Begins At Home.
@Alex: Good to see you back over here. The million dollar question is how does one become present. To me it’s a continual effort until you really are there for good. The key I think is to just continually remind yourself of presence.
@Gordie: I would agree that most of these living legends had to be fully present to execute their performance the way they did. If their mind wandered it would be very obvious in their performances.
Srinivas Rao´s last blog ..The Single Most Important Quality for Peak Performance