Distractions Quotes

I worked closely with Steve Peters, the British Cycling team's psychologist, and we came up with a strategy of dealing with the pressure. It basically involved displacing the negative thoughts with visualisation. Not a complicated technique, but very effective if done properly. I just kept running through the race in my head over and over so that I wouldn't let the distractions around me put me off. ~ Chris Hoy

Like serious reading itself, travel has now become an act of resistance against the distractions of the electronic age, and against all the worries that weigh us down, thanks to that age. A good book deserves to be finished, just as a haunting landscape tempts further experience of it, and further research into it. Travel and serious reading, because they demand sustained focus, stand athwart the nonexistent attention spans that deface our current time on Earth. ~ Robert D. Kaplan

When I took my oath of office to serve as your Governor, remember, I swore to steadfastly and doggedly guard the interests of this great state like a grizzly with cubs, as a mother naturally guards her own. Alaska, as a statewide family, we've got to fight for each other, not against and not let external, sensationalized distractions draw us off course. As an exciting year of unpredictable change begins, we, too, have our work cut out for us. And we're all in this together. Just like our musk ox, they circle up to protect their future when they are challenged. We've got to do the same. ~ Sarah Palin

Everything in life turns out to be a distraction from the real thing you want to do. There are a million distractions and when I was a kid I was very disciplined. I knew that the other kids weren't. I was the one able to do the thing, not because I had more talent, maybe less, but because they simply weren't applying themselves. ~ Woody Allen

In this day and age, there is a limitless plethora of readily available distractions just waiting to take your mind off what you were supposed to be doing, and instead keep you unproductive and unmotivated. With distractions so easy to come by, and society so geared towards instant gratification as opposed to "Hard graft" for results, it is little wonder that many people suffer from a condition most commonly referred to as laziness. ~ James Frankton

If one is the kind of creature I am and wants to do the kind of writing I want to do, an undisturbed bourgeois existence with no distractions seems in order. A single meeting outside the family upsets one's whole inner web, makes one start off on two-days' thinking and weighing, destroys a delicate balance etc. etc ... I now have enough friends to last me a lifetime and that is enough. I am going to close the doors and hibernate at least for a couple of years. I am frightfully depressed about my work. It seems to me perfectly mediocre. ~ May Sarton

Learn to shut out the distractions that keep you from truly worshiping God. ~ Billy Graham

The distractions of the world are great and many. Let's not allow ourselves to become entrenched to the neck, or we may well drown. ~ Dara Reidyr

If you want to make yourself more sensitive to the small details in your work, cultivate a habit of imagining, as specifically as possible, what you expect to see and do when you get to your desk. Then you'll be prone to notice the tiny ways in which real life deviates from the narrative inside your head. If you want to become better at listening to your children, tell yourself stories about what they said to you at dinnertime last night. Narrate your life, as you are living it, and you'll encode those experiences deeper in your brain. If you need to improve your focus and learn to avoid distractions, take a moment to visualize, with as much detail as possible, what you are about to do. It is easier to know what's ahead when there's a well-rounded script inside your head. ~ Charles Duhigg

Phones are distracting. The internet is distracting.The way he looked at you? He wasn't distracted. He was consumed. ~ Stephanie Perkins

We are nothing more than distractions for each other, and distractions get you killed. But my hands close over his, our fingers lacing, until our bones are woven together. The fire is dying, flames reduced to embers. But Cal is still here. He will never leave me. ~ Victoria Aveyard

Mustapha Mond paused, put down the first book and, picking up the other, turned over the pages. "Take this, for example," he said, and in his deep voice once more began to read: "'A man grows old; he feels in himself that radical sense of weakness, of listlessness, of discomfort, which accompanies the advance of age; and, feeling thus, imagines himself merely sick, lulling his fears with the notion that this distressing condition is due to some particular cause, from which, as from an illness, he hopes to recover. Vain imaginings! That sickness is old age; and a horrible disease it is.
They say that it is the fear of death and of what comes after death that makes men turn to religion as they advance in years. But my own experience has given me the conviction that, quite apart from any such terrors or imaginings, the religious sentiment tends to develop as we grow older; to develop because, as the passions grow calm, as the fancy and sensibilities are less excited and less excitable, our reason becomes less troubled in its working, less obscured by the images, desires and distractions, in which it used to be absorbed; whereupon God emerges as from behind a cloud; our soul feels, sees, turns towards the source of all light; turns naturally and inevitably; for now that all that gave to the world of sensations its life and charms has begun to leak away from us, now that phenomenal existence is no more bolstered up by impressions from within or from without, we feel the need ~ Aldous Huxley

Poorly chosen objects are distractions, obstacles we put in the way when we're afraid of telling the truth. ~ Lauren Graham

I imagine that one of the biggest troubles with colleges is there are too many distractions, too much panty-raiding, fraternities, and boola-boola and all of that. ~ Malcolm X

I do a lot of writing on planes, actually. It's my time that I can just relax and have absolutely no distractions. ~ Jessica Lowndes

My house has too many distractions. There's the email. There's checking my Amazon ranking. I know I'm the only author who's ever done that, ever. There's the fax. Too many distractions. I like to go out and write. ~ Harlan Coben

If you don't know your purpose, discover it, now.
The core of your life is your purpose. Everything in your life, from your diet to your career, must be aligned with your purpose if you are to act with coherence and integrity in the world. If you know your purpose, your deepest desire, then the secret of success is to discipline your life so that you support your deepest purpose and minimize distractions and detours. ~ David Deida

Men have always been a prey to distractions, which arethe original sins of the mind; but never before today has an attempt been made to organize and exploit distractions, to make of them, because of their economic importance, the core and vital center of human life, to idealize them as the highest manifestations of mental activity. Ours is an age of systematized irrelevances, and the imbecile within us has become one of the Titans, upon whose shoulders rests the weight of the social and economic system ~ Aldous Huxley

He seems like a good guy, but we need to focus on finding Nia's killer, and then finish the theater. We don't have time for distractions. No men."
"Yeah, yeah, I know." Mel rolled her eyes.
"Inspiration before intercourse."
Callie chuckled. "I should put that on a T-shirt. ~ Lisa Kessler

King Maven of House Calore meets my gaze the moment he knows I'm here....The instant hangs, suspended on a thread of time. A canyon of distractions yawns between us, filled with so much noise and graceful chaos, but the room might as well be empty. ~ Victoria Aveyard

Silence can bring with it a vacancy that in its turn craves the distraction of the human voice or the obscuring impact created...by music. These distractions can help to stifle the terror of being abandoned to the silence of the noisy mind. ~ Juliet Nicolson

But Hey, Guess What
Crazy means I'm not liable
for my actions. So screw it,
I'll go home, propped up on
Prozac against distractions ~ Ellen Hopkins

To be truly successful you have to break away from the crowds, popularity and your ego for a while. Somewhere you can work towards achieving your goals, say no to distractions and concentrate on studying and practicing. ~ Francis Shenstone

You have a number of choices. You could continue to always fight against people who are really distractions. They're people in the cheap seats of life. Or you can do what you went there to do. ~ Clarence Thomas

You will encounter many distractions and many temptations to put your goal aside: The security of a job, a wife who wants kids, whatever. But if you hang in there, always following your vision, I have no doubt you will succeed. ~ Larry Flynt

We should not be distracted by anything; neither by dreams, whether evil or seemingly good, nor by the thought of anything, whether good or bad, nor by distress or deceitful joy, nor by self-conceit or despair, nor by depression or elation, nor by a sense of abandonment or by illusory help and strength, nor by negligence or progress, nor by laziness or seeming zeal, nor by apparent dispassion or passionate attachment. Rather with humility we should strive to maintain a state of stillness, free from all distraction, knowing that no one can do us harm unless we ourselves wish for it. ~ Peter Of Damascus

Find a quiet place, and just read. If you're reading an ebook, clear away everything else but your ebook reader.
Then you settle into the reading, and enjoy it. Bask in the luxury of reading without distractions. ~ Leo Babauta

I have found that lived out, the hardest place to be a Christian is to be in a nice prosperous country with a lot of entertainment options because there's so many distractions. ~ Philip Yancey

The splendid wooden mosque - which you can find if you search - nobody would think of showing you, being less aware of what they have than what they lack. They lack technology: we want to get out of the impasse into which too much technology has led us, our sensibilities saturated to the nth degree with Information and a Culture of distractions. We're counting on their formulae to revive us; they're counting on ours to live. Our paths cross without mutual understanding, and sometimes the traveler gets impatient, but there is a great deal of self-centeredness in such impatience. ~ Nicolas Bouvier

No one's brain is different enough to make constant interruptions, distractions, and task-switching an optimal environment in which to function. No one's. ~ Susan Maushart

Writing is the process of finding something to distract you from writing, and of all the helpful distractions - adultery, alcohol and acedia, all of which aided our writing fathers - none can equal the Internet. ~ Adam Gopnik

Havin loved enough and lost enough,
I'm no longer searching,
just opening,
no longer trying to make sense of pain
but trying to be a soft and sturdy home
in which real things can land.
These are the irritations
that rub into a pearl.
So we can talk for a while
but then we must listen,
the way rocks listen to the sea.
And we can churn at all that goes wrong
but then we must lay all distractions
down and water every living seed.
And yes, on nights like tonight
I too feel along. But seldom do I
face it squarely enough
to see that it's a door
into the endless berath
that has no breather,
into the surf that human
shell calls God. ~ Mark Nepo

Thinking about sadness and loneliness, and what it means to be sad, how to live with it, walk through it and grow from it. There is a loneliness in sadness that one can find distractions to escape, but at the end of the day, there it is again. So, how to embrace that loneliness, and trust the uncertainty of tomorrow and the next days, weeks, and months? Loneliness seems like a constantly expanding universe and the sadness is like a sheer veil surrounding it. The two work hand in hand, and there is only one way to navigate; go deep into oneself, as no one else has the map. None of this is a terrible thing; sadness adds rich meaningful layers into life, painful as it is, and loneliness is only a state of mind. Profound changes can come from living your sadness, feeling it completely, and housing it in solitude. The day will come when one emerges, brave and beautiful. ~ Riitta Klint

I knew too well the nature of life's distractions and enticements-how the piecemeal progress of our hopes and ambitions commands our undivided attention, reshaping the ethereal into the tangible, and commitments into compromises. ~ Amor Towles

I find that when I come out of the library I'm in what I call the library bliss of being totally taken away from the distractions of life.
[Woman's Day magazine, March 12, 2002] ~ Tracy Chevalier

I always have on my headphones to block out all of the other distractions and I'm just focused on doing the best that I can ... There a few of them ... DMX Party Up ... Mack 10 BC and Ice Cube Connected for Life. I also listen to the Eminem CD ... whichever song really gets me going that night ~ Michael Phelps

It might behoove us to realize that isolation is the absence of all the senseless clutter, and all the incessant racket that would keep God from having ample room to show up and sufficient silence to be heard. Therefore, isolation may actually be the place where we are least isolated. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Fine. Everybody wears seatbelts. No radio. No distractions." Ben shot Hi a stern look. "No running commentary." "Your loss," Hi said. "To the pimp ride! ~ Kathy Reichs

Zen culture invites us to experience reality without the intervening distractions of intellect, categories, analysis. ~ Tom Hoover

Man's condition ought to impel him to seek to discover whether there is a God and a solution to his predicament. But people occupy their time and their thoughts with trivialities and distractions, so as to avoid the despair, boredom, and anxiety that would inevitably result if those diversions were removed. ~ William Lane Craig

Anxiety and depression, and the physical symptoms they cause, are merely distractions and smokescreens to "protect" you from dangers, which are usually, imaginary. ~ Charles F. Glassman

Another way to think about Centering Prayer is training the mind to become free from distractions so it can "rest in God. ~ Amos Smith

One of the names of Buddha is TATHAGATA - one who lives in suchness, one who has become free from all the distractions of the mind. And the miracle is that the mind consists only of distraction, so once you are free of all distractions there is no mind left. In the present there is no mind. In the present there is only consciousness, awareness, watchfulness. ~ Rajneesh

We have been seduced by sound bites. It is difficult to imagine how we are going to have an intelligent conversation around complex theopolitical issues as long as the average news consumer in America is willing to be sound-bite driven. We face a sorry state of affairs in our culture when few people seem willing to take the time for nuanced discussion on the complicated challenges we face. Politicians of all parties have been willing to foster this sound-bite mentality because it has worked for them. Most Americans work hard and are faced with too little time and too many distractions to study the issues well enough to make an informed judgment on them. As long as news consumers are willing to be manipulated by sound bites and are unwilling to commit the time to understand the complexities, we will continue to see artificial and simplistic distinctions drive too much of our conversation, resulting in divisions and disagreements that rarely get at the substantive issues. ~ Charles E. Gutenson

Simplicity of living means meeting life face to face. It means confronting life clearly, without unnecessary distractions. It means being direct and honest in relationships of all kinds. It means taking life as it is. ~ Duane Elgin

I was gratified by the way our players had approached each game throughout the season. They had remained focused on the task at hand, playing hard and smart week after week. We didn't have any turmoil or distractions. We went about our business as usual. To do that in a setting that often was anything but usual is a testament to the character of our players and coaches. Our process worked; we simply picked a bad year to only be very good. ~ Tony Dungy

When we constantly fill up all our "empty" time with stimulation in the form of electronic devices, games, and distractions, our brains become disengaged and the thinking process is effectively halted. We never get to hear our own inner voice-we don't develop a relationship with ourselves and our minds. We don't get to know who we are because we're not listening. ~ Keri Smith

Errors have nothing to do with luck; they are caused by time pressure, discomfort or unfamiliarilty with a position, distractions, feelings of intimidation, nervous tension, overambition, excessive caution, and dozens of other psychological factors. ~ Pal Benko

. . . the bond bubble, the tech bubble, the stock bubble, the emerging markets bubble, the housing bubble. . . One by one they had all burst, and their bursting showed that they had been temporary solutions to long-term problems, maybe evasions of those problems, distractions. With so many bubbles-so many people chasing ephemera, all at the same time-it was clear that things were fundamentally not working. ~ Peter Thiel

I have fought too hard and for too long against discrimination based on race and color not to stand up against discrimination based on sexual orientation. I've heard the reasons for opposing civil marriage for same-sex couples. Cut through the distractions, and they stink of the same fear, hatred and intolerance I have known in racism and in bigotry. ~ John Lewis

The capacity to be overwhelmed by the beautiful is astonishingly sturdy and survives amidst the harshest distractions. ~ Susan Sontag

I am talking about something more than just the gauzy circle of life. Sure, you're older now and one day you're going to die, but before that, you have to *die*. Your child has arrived and the battle has been joined. It is the battle to the death of your ego. The demise of your selfishness and impatience. The end of your idle distractions and carelessness. The decline and fall of Numero Uno. Or so you must pray, because in this contest, you must lose or lose quickly. Pray that you will never bear the shattered consequences of winning when your child's safety, trust, and happiness are the casualties. ~ Karen Maezen Miller

Is not prayer the intensely personal struggle within each disciple, and among us collectively, to resist the despair and distractions that cause us to practice unbelief, to abandon or avoid the way of Jesus? ~ Ched Myers

When introverts go to church, we crave sanctuary in every sense of the word, as we flee from the disorienting distractions of twenty-first-century life. We desire to escape from superficial relationships, trivial communications and the constant noise that pervade our world, and find rest in the probing depths of God's love. ~ Adam S. McHugh

Modern civilization is so complex as to make the devotional life all but impossible. It wears us out by multiplying distractions and beats us down by destroying our solitude, where otherwise we might drink and renew our strength before going out to face the world again. ~ Aiden Wilson Tozer

Our lives are full of things. Disposable distractions, stuff you buy but do not cherish, own yet never love. Thrown away in weeks, rather than passed down for generations. Perhaps things will be different now. Wiser choices made with greater care. After all, if the fewer things you own always excite you, Would you really miss the many that never could? ~ The De Beers Family Of Companies

If love and friendship makes you unhappy, try solitude. ~ Michael Bassey Johnson

My distraction's my defense against this lack of inspiration Against this slow deflation Yeah the further the horizon The more it holds my gaze The foreground's out of focus but you know I kinda hope it's just a phase Just a phase. ~ Ani DiFranco

Stand strong, firm and rooted like a solid tree. Though distractions may cause you to waver, remain balanced and calm. Otherwise, you will surely snap in half and fall to the ground at the slightest hint of difficulty. Be a filter, not a sponge. Learn to remove unnecessary junk from your life before it becomes a part of who you are. Stand tall, stand proud, keep your eyes and your body focused. Otherwise, you will blow away with the slightest gust of wind. ~ Leigh Hershkovich

Oh let the lemons lie there,
upended yellow boats, their empty inboards
so clean and white, let them always ferry
such distractions from ourselves. ~ Michael J. Rosen

There is a deep-seated tendency, it's almost a compulsion, to distract ourselves, even when we're not consciously feeling uncomfortable. Everybody feels a little bit of an itch all the time. There's a background hum of edginess, boredom, restlessness. As I've said, during my time in retreat where there were almost no distractions, even there I experienced this deep uneasiness. The ~ Pema Chodron

He could see now that asking the dead about his father was nearly useless, so burdened were they with their own losses and regrets and distractions. He had no right to press them. It was not enough merely to let them speak. If anything, he should try to bring them comfort, to shorten their suffering. Anything else was selfish, thoughtless, at best redundant. He was also finding it too easy to take on their pain, perhaps because he was more like them than he wanted to admit. Or rather, he had let himself become like them, a wanderer, someone lost in a world he had hewn from his own pain. ~ Ari Berk

There are two kinds of peacemakers in the modern world; and they are both, though in various ways, a nuisance. The first peacemaker is the man who goes about saying that he agrees with everybody. He confuses everybody. The second peacemaker is the man who goes about saying that everybody agrees with him. He enrages everybody. Between the two of them they produce a hundred times more disputes and distractions than we poor pugnacious people would ever have thought of in our lives. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

Fairy tales are about trouble, about getting into and out of it, and trouble seems to be a necessary stage on the route to becoming. All the magic and glass mountains and pearls the size of houses and princesses beautiful as the day and talking birds and part-time serpents are distractions from the core of most of the stories, the struggle to survive against adversaries, to find your place in the world, and to come into your own.

Fairy tales are almost always the stories of the powerless, of youngest sons, abandoned children, orphans, of humans transformed into birds and beasts or otherwise enchanted away from their own lives and selves. Even princesses are chattels to be disowned by fathers, punished by step-mothers, or claimed by princes, though they often assert themselves in between and are rarely as passive as the cartoon versions. Fairy tales are children's stories not in wh they were made for but in their focus on the early stages of life, when others have power over you and you have power over no one.

In them, power is rarely the right tool for survival anyway. Rather the powerless thrive on alliances, often in the form of reciprocated acts of kindness -- from beehives that were not raided, birds that were not killed but set free or fed, old women who were saluted with respect. Kindness sewn among the meek is harvested in crisis...

In Hans Christian Andersen's retelling of the old Nordic tale that begins with a stepmother, "The Wild Sw ~ Rebecca Solnit

Procrastination is an eclipse to your true potential. ~ Neeraj Agnihotri

Don't worry about where you are or what you have or even what you think you want. Take one step at a time and worry only about only this - who you are - who you really are. Find what you love, love what makes you happy - try giving instead of getting, try caring instead of hating. Remove the mindless distractions from your life and focus on the things and people that matter the most to you. Follow your heart to discover what makes you happy, never let go of it, never devalue anything that is beautiful, and build a life that lets you be yourself. ~ Benjamin F Sullivan

Often our biggest distractions are not external, but come from within. Get out of your own way! ~ Mani S. Sivasubramanian

Stay focused on your values. Stay focused on what is most important to you. Don't let what is happening around you distract you, from you. Don't give drama any time and attention. ~ Akiroq Brost

I'd find someone else. No distractions. Men get in the way of ambition. Plus, they laugh at you when you fail ~ Rose Pressey

I have been, earlier in my life, a lazy writer. I'd spend three hours at the gym to avoid writing, or I'd just find other distractions - reading, doing laundry, talking on the phone, etc. But suddenly I was like a laser beam: I was relentlessly focused, sometimes to the detriment of other things. ~ Emily Susan Rapp

People don't want their lives fixed. Nobody wants their problems solved. Their dramas. Their distractions. Their stories resolved. Their messed cleaned up. Because what would they have left? Just the big scary unknown. ~ Chuck Palahniuk

I attribute much of my success in New York to my ability to understand and avoid unnecessary distractions. ~ Derek Jeter

I think my work has to do with a sense that we are attempting, all the time, to create a logical, rational path through the day. To the left and right there are an amazing set of distractions that we usually can't afford to follow. But the poet is willing to stop anywhere. ~ Billy Collins

Working from home meant we could vary snack and coffee breaks, change our desks or view, goof off, drink on the job, even spend the day in pajamas, and often meet to gossip or share ideas. On the other hand, we bossed ourselves around, set impossible goals, and demanded longer hours than office jobs usually entail. It was the ultimate "flextime," in that it depended on how flexible we felt each day, given deadlines, distractions, and workaholic crescendos. ~ Diane Ackerman

When I meet with the founders of a new company, my advice is almost always, 'Do fewer things.' It's true of partnerships, marketing opportunities, anything that's taking up your time. The vast majority of things are distractions, and very few really matter to your success. ~ Evan Williams

A superficial freedom to wander aimlessly here or there, to taste this or that, to make a choice of distractions, is simply a sham. It claims to be a freedom of "choice" when it has evaded the basic task of discovering who it is that chooses. ~ Thomas Merton

When I've got massive projects to be getting on with, I find myself open to distractions, particularly when deadlines are involved. ~ Max Tundra

Do not watch TV aimlessly. Do not go on social media aimlessly. Always be aware of what you are doing, and why you are doing it. Don't value TV less. Value it more. Then you will watch it less. Unchecked distractions will lead you to distraction. ~ Matt Haig

Some time ago, my son Emilio was going back to school after vacation. He did not like the idea at all and was filled with anxiety. To him, the approach of school days was like a monster that threatened him and wanted to squash him. What is a parent supposed to do? I tried to lift his spirits, to distract him, convince him it was not as bad as it seemed, but in vain. Then I hit upon the idea of offering him something that is almost taboo in our family: French fries at a fast-food place. Usually anything that is prohibited appeals to Emilio, especially junk food. I thought I had the ace up my sleeve. But no. Emilio's reply ought to be chiseled in stone: "Dad, you don't solve problems with french fries."

Touche. You don't pretend problems do not exist, and you can't solve them with ephemeral distractions. You have to face them with open-eyed honesty. Offering French fries to my son in order to console and distract him from his anxiety was by no means a kind act. I was simply choosing the easier option--far too easy. I had found a comfortable way out. ~ Piero Ferrucci

Sometimes those distractions are what God's telling us to pray about most. ~ Alana Terry

Don't fall into the trap of thinking about politics in your workplace too much. Just work hard, be cheerful, ignore distractions. ~ Mindy Kaling

The commandment to work is imposed on us by our descent from Adam and Eve, but it is a blessing to us. Illness and adversity are not punishments for being alive; they are natural accompaniments of life. Our bodies are not vile and loathsome snares for our spirits, but the temples of our spirits. The daily activities of mixing orange juice, making telephone calls, supervising homework, and scrubbing the bathtub are not distractions from our spiritual lives. They are the vehicles through which we live our spiritual lives. ~ Chieko N. Okazaki

Private listening really took off in 1979, with the popularity of the Walkman portable cassette player. Listening to music on a Walkman is a variation of the "sitting very still in a concert hall" experience (there are no acoustic distractions), combined with the virtual space (achieved by adding reverb and echo to the vocals and instruments) that studio recording allows. With headphones on, you can hear and appreciate extreme detail and subtlety, and the lack of uncontrollable reverb inherent in hearing music in a live room means that rhythmic material survives beautifully and completely intact; it doesn't get blurred or turned into sonic mush as it often does in a concert hall. You, and only you, the audience of one, can hear a million tiny details, even with the compression that MP3 technology adds to recordings. You can hear the singer's breath intake, their fingers on a guitar string. That said, extreme and sudden dynamic changes can be painful on a personal music player. As ~ David Byrne

No more distractions. The elation of finally being alone was total. We walked straight west. I had everything I needed in the world resting comfortably on my shoulders, and the entire country waiting to be discovered. ~ Peter Jenkins

Treat distractions as the enemy. The internet is brilliant but it is one very efficient way of wasting your time. ~ David Hieatt

One of my great loves is golf. When I am in L.A., I like to play with a few close friends: no phones, no distractions, the great outdoors and the chance to bet some money to keep it interesting. ~ Nobu Matsuhisa

The evolution of social media into a robust mechanism for social transformation is already visible. Despite many adamant critics who insist that tools like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are little more than faddish distractions useful only to exchange trivial information, these critics are being proven wrong time and again. ~ Simon Mainwaring

You feel overwhelmed by distractions, fantasies, the disturbing desire to throw yourself into the world of pleasure. But you know already that you will not find there an answer to your deepest question. Nor does the answer lie in rehashing old events, or in guilt or shame. All of that makes you dissipate yourself and leave the rock on which your house is built. ~ Henri J.M. Nouwen

Social media not only snatches your time, but it also teaches you attention deficiency. ~ Neeraj Agnihotri

Knowing that one thing you want is a great step. Sure, whether you prefer or not, you'll get offers, and many will seem that one thing you want. ~ Ufuoma Apoki

In a universe devoid of life, any life at all would be immensely meaningful. We ARE that meaning. "And what we see, "says the poet Mary Oliver, "is the world that cannot cherish us, but which we cherish." As though life itself is the great, universal, unrequited love of all time. But there is even more to this. Deep mystery. We are the universe aware of itself. We let the miracle get lost in distractions. On a planet so rich with living companions, much of humanity sentences itself to solitary confinement. Late at night, I used to lie in my boat listening to radio calls from ships to families ashore. There was only one conversation, and it boils down to, "I love you and I miss you: come home safe." Connections make us individuals. Ironic, isn't it? The more connected, the more unique our life becomes ... ~ Carl Safina

I'm going to take a shower. You're going to be good, try not to be sexy or freak me out or anything like that. I've got to concentrate, preparing for a formal party is serious business. I don't need distractions."
His eyes went half-mast and his half-grin appeared.
"You're doing it!"I accused.
His eyebrows went up.
I shook my head. "Never mind".
Then I stomped to the shower. ~ Kristen Ashley

Increase Your Productivity We live in a demanding and distracting world. Being productive can sometimes feel like an impossible feat. Here are three ways to get more done without burning out: Keep one to-do list. Include everything you want or need to do in one place. Writing it down helps get it off your mind and leaves you free to focus on the task at hand. Do the most important thing first. Before you leave work in the evening, decide what one thing you need to accomplish the next day. Do it first thing in the morning, when you're likely to have the most energy and fewest distractions. Schedule time for non-urgent things. It's easy to get caught up in the pressing issues of the day. Block off time in your calendar to do things that would otherwise get squeezed out, like writing, thinking creatively, or building relationships. ~ Anonymous

Yet among all the distractions and diversions of a planet which now seemed well on the way to becoming one vast playground, there were some who still found time to repeat an ancient and never-answered question:
"Where do we go from here? ~ Arthur C. Clarke

I'm fine with being alone," he insists. "I like the company I keep. Most people need constant distractions, because if they slow down long enough to evaluate their lives, it makes them internally combust. Like if you folded them inside out, you'd find a huge monster inside. A train wreck. ~ Katie Kacvinsky

In a world of seven billion people, where every inch of land has been mapped, much of it developed, and too much of it destroyed, the sea remains the final unseen, untouched, and undiscovered wilderness, the planet's last great frontier. There are no mobile phones down there, no e-mails, no tweeting, no twerking, no car keys to lose, no terrorist threats, no birthdays to forget, no penalties for late credit card payments, and no dog shit to step in before a job interview. All the stress, noise, and distractions of life are left at the surface. The ocean is the last truly quiet place on Earth. ~ James Nestor

This election is about the past vs. the future. It's about whether we settle for the same divisions and distractions and drama that passes for politics today or whether we reach for a politics of common sense and innovation, a politics of shared sacrifice and shared prosperity. There are those who will continue to tell us that we can't do this, that we can't have what we're looking for, that we can't have what we want, that we're peddling false hopes. But here is what I know. I know that when people say we can't overcome all the big money and influence in Washington, I think of that elderly woman who sent me a contribution the other day, an envelope that had a money order for $3.01 along with a verse of scripture tucked inside the envelope. So don't tell us change isn't possible. That woman knows change is possible. When I hear the cynical talk that blacks and whites and Latinos can't join together and work together, I'm reminded of the Latino brothers and sisters I organized with and stood with and fought with side by side for jobs and justice on the streets of Chicago. So don't tell us change can't happen. When I hear that we'll never overcome the racial divide in our politics, I think about that Republican woman who used to work for Strom Thurmond, who is now devoted to educating inner city-children and who went out into the streets of South Carolina and knocked on doors for this campaign. Don't tell me we can't change. Yes, we can. Yes, we can change. Yes, we can.
Barack Obama

Hope Obama