Have you ever been given negative feedback you weren’t expecting that felt confusing?

Has someone ever asked you a question that made you freeze?

Have you ever fell into people-pleasing, just because you didn’t want to upset the other person?

Have you ever tried to convince someone of something and were unsure of your rationale?

Have you ever had someone approach you who was upset, only to find you were too uncomfortable to truly listen to them?

These scenarios play out because you haven’t learned how to direct your attention.

One of the most valuable distinctions I have found for navigating life, business, and relationships, is to know where your attention needs to be at any given moment, and to direct it accordingly.

Attention can either be directed INWARD, or it can be directed OUT, toward others.

Both are necessary, but each has its own time and place. If you don’t know when to keep your attention in, or when to keep it out, the results can send you into a tailspin and confuse those around you. At best, you are frustrated because you are not accomplishing what you set out to do.

Attention In

When you keep your attention INWARD, you tune into your needs, your wants, and your desires. You honor your internal compass that is designed to help you navigate life. You are solid on your guiding values and use them as a filter for making decisions. You experience your emotions and move through them.

If you don’t take the time to direct your attention inward, you don’t ever fully know who you are or what you want. You end up living what Khalil Gibran calls a half a life rather than a full life.

Attention Out

When you direct your attention OUT, you put your attention on the person in front of you. It might look like curiosity, empathy, or appealing to the needs and desires of someone else.

I’ll say it again. BOTH are needed. 

The problem is we don’t know how to occupy one state or the other fully. 100% attention IN, or 100% attention OUT.

Society and culture does not teach us how. Especially if you grew up in the South 🙋🏻‍♀️, where “niceness” is a value. And especially if you are a woman. 

Let’s run through the scenarios outlined above.

1. Someone gives you negative feedback you weren’t expecting. 

If you go INWARD immediately, you may question yourself. This could go in two directions: self-doubt or indignation. In either case, rather than acknowledge the person is trying to help you (or the work product), you send the signal that you are either insecure or miffed. Ultimately, the person feels their feedback hasn’t been received.

But what if instead of going inward in that moment, you keep your attention OUT? The scenario could play out completely differently. You might become curious and ask them another question so you can understand where they’re coming from. You might empathize with why they feel that way and meet them in a new way. In both cases, the person giving the feedback feels seen and heard. They know you have heard their feedback. What you do with the feedback can be saved for a future moment, when you have time and space to direct your attention IN.

2. Someone asks you a question that makes you freeze. 

The freeze is because you are going INWARD. Your attention is drawn to how awkard and uncomfortable you feel. You are speechless and have no idea what to say. 

If you were to immediately turn your attention OUT, you might ask them why they think their question is appropriate (question their question). You might ask them a clarifying question to give you time to think (staying curious). You might label their desire with something like, “it sounds like you really want to accelerate the timeline, even at the expense of quality, is that right? (showing empathy - you heard them). By keeping your attention OUT, you can move out of the freeze and keep your attention on THEM, and thereby keep the conversation moving forward.

3. You agree to something that someone else wants, even though it isn’t what you want. (This is the definition of a boundary, by the way).

This one is tricky. What’s really happening is you feel like you can’t handle the discomfort of disappointing the other person (attention IN), so you give them what they want. 

If you were to keep your attention OUT, you might honor your boundary and say NO, and empathize with how you understand your decision might disappoint them. 

4. You are trying to convince someone of something that you want.

Making a request or appeal could go either way. If your attention is IN, you will connect deeply with your desire before you make your appeal. It will be so irresistible that they will want to help you fulfill your desire.

If your attention is OUT, you will appeal to what the OTHER person wants or needs. You will show them how the proposed solution is good for THEM. Your attention is 100% on them, even if it is something you want.

Starting to see how this works?

Let’s look at the last scenario.

5. Someone approaches you when they are upset. They want to vent and unload and possibly need you to take action.

If your attention goes IN, you will likely focus on how uncomfortable you feel. Most of us grew up in an environment where BIG emotions were not welcome or allowed. You feel the discomfort and can’t even listen to what the person is trying to convey.

But turn your attention OUT, and you can step into empathy 100%. You understand why they feel the way they do, in fact you might even feel that way if you were in the same situation, and their emotion begins to dissipate because you SEE them. Then you can begin to work toward a solution.

What insights have you had as you reflect on where you direct your attention in certain scenarios?

In closing, I’ll leave you with this poem by Khalil Gibran, to inspire you to occupy either attention IN or attention OUT 100%:

“Do not love half lovers

Do not entertain half friends

Do not indulge in works of the half talented

Do not live half a life

and do not die a half death

If you choose silence, then be silent

When you speak, do so until you are finished

Do not silence yourself to say something

And do not speak to be silent

If you accept, then express it bluntly

Do not mask it

If you refuse then be clear about it

for an ambiguous refusal is but a weak acceptance

Do not accept half a solution

Do not believe half truths

Do not dream half a dream

Do not fantasize about half hopes

Half a drink will not quench your thirst

Half a meal will not satiate your hunger

Half the way will get you no where

Half an idea will bear you no results

Your other half is not the one you love

It is you in another time yet in the same space

It is you when you are not

Half a life is a life you didn't live,

A word you have not said

A smile you postponed

A love you have not had

A friendship you did not know

To reach and not arrive

Work and not work

Attend only to be absent

What makes you a stranger to them closest to you

and they strangers to you

The half is a mere moment of inability

but you are able for you are not half a being

You are a whole that exists to live a life

not half a life”

Love,

Audrey