Clearing Your Mental Runway

Posted on May 17, 2010 | 0 comments

For me it was 10 years of continuous thinking about my PhD research. For you, it might be worry about where the next paycheck is going to come from or how someone in your life has wronged you. All of the above chew up a portion of our mental capacity and therefore keep us from being the best that we can be.

After having completed my PhD Systems Engineering, I now reflect upon a long and arduous path with satisfaction. However, this new perspective also points out the fact that my brain had been functioning at a less than optimal efficiency for that same period of time.

There was not a day (probably not even a minute) that went by in which I didn’t feel the weight and pressure of having to further my PhD research. Yes, there were times when I might temporarily get my mind off of the PhD but it never disappeared completely. This meant that my businesses were short changed. And my family received only 80% or maybe 90% of my focus. Not good.

If you are currently harboring anger, resentment, stress, or thoughts of something else going on in your life, you are chewing up a portion of your mental energies. Just like your computer, it works well when have only one application open. However, try opening 12 different applications and get ready for the blue screen of death (if you are a PC user).

Whatever the nature of your consuming thoughts, most folks believe that those thoughts affect only themselves. What’s scary is that when you apply a “systems lens” it shows us that this is not true. When your mental energies are being consumed, you cannot give 100% to the event at-hand. When you fail to give 100% of you to an effort, you are not only affecting yourself but you are affecting others around you.

Your challenge is “clear your mental runway” for take-off. Ideally, try to resolve the consuming thoughts and rid yourself of them entirely. The fall back plan is to focus yourself from event to event or situation to situation. For instance, leave work thoughts at work so that you are 100% present with family. Or leave family thoughts at the door when you punch in for work.

“Clearing your mental runway” is easier said than done. Yet half the battle is being aware of the fact that you may be harboring mental energies that are negatively affecting everything that you are doing.