Take Your Eye Off the Ball

We all know that if you want to succeed in life, we need to stay focused and keep our eye on the ball. I’d like you to take a look at this short video to learn more about the importance of keeping your eye on the ball.

After watching the video, you can see what happens if you are always keeping your eye on the ball.

You can miss a lot.

What if you learned that many of the greatest inventions and discoveries happened specifically because the inventor was looking somewhere other than at the ball? What if you knew that taking your eye off of the ball and just noticing your surroundings is one of the most important ways to come up with completely new ideas?

In his book, “The Click Moment,” Frans Johansson shares several examples of how successful ideas were spawned when someone took their eye off the ball and allowed themselves the space to think about things differently:

• In 1982, Howard Schultz, the Director of Marketing at Starbucks, visited Milan to attend a housewares show. He chose to walk from his hotel to the convention center and stopped in an espresso bar. After noticing many amazing espresso bars during his trip, he brought the idea back to his team in Seattle. This idea evolved into the Starbucks we know today.
• Designer Diane Von Furstenburg created the iconic wrap dress after seeing Julie Nixon Eisenhower do a TV interview wearing one of her wrap tops with one of skirts. She had an a-ha moment that she should put the two together and the wrap dress was born.

Ideas are formed when we notice new things and incorporate them into our current base of knowledge.

When I watched the gorilla video, I was bound and determined to get an accurate count of the ball passes. I failed to see the gorilla at all.

My daughter on the other hand, shouted, “Why is there a Yeti-thing in that video?” She didn’t get the count right, but she saw something that other people might miss.

Sometimes, you need to take your eye off the ball so you can see the whole picture.

One of my favorite books is “The Artist’s Way,” by Julia Cameron. In it, she provides some unique ideas for connecting with and unleashing your inner artist. One of my favorite assignments is to take yourself on an artist date every week.

“An artist date is a block of time, perhaps two hours weekly, especially set aside and committed to nurturing your creative consciousness, your inner artist.”

– Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

If you are trying to develop yourself as an artist, this is a great activity, but if you just want to see new things, you can easily incorporate this into your daily errands. If you are making a Target run, rather than just picking up the brand of coffee you always get, take some time to scan some of the other brands, flavors or items on the shelf. If you are waiting in line at the DMV, take a look around at the different ways people dress or speak.

Learning is all around us, if we just take the time to look.

If you drive the same route to work every day, take a different way. Visit the library and flip through magazines that you’ve never heard of. If you like fashion magazines, try reading Psychology Today. If you like reading Psychology Today, try reading a fashion magazine.

Pick up scraps from here and pieces from there. See if they combine into something new and unique.

My eyes were opened after I saw that my daughter, who sometimes has trouble focusing on the task at hand, could spot a gorilla right in front of her face while I completely missed it because I was keeping my eye on the ball.

When you need to focus…focus. But if you don’t, then open your eyes to the world around you and all of the wonderful, interesting things it can reveal. Be eternally curious about everything that exists outside of the ball.

Photo by Francesca Runza on Unsplash