Harnessing the power of obsession

You can’t stop thinking about it; you lie awake at night because of it; no matter what you do; every other thought is about it. You “eat and drink” it. You’re completely obsessed.

Now depending on what “it” is; your obsession may be crippling or your obsession may be the greatest asset you have to accomplishing monumental tasks. Obsession has a negative connotation mostly because of stories about people infatuated with celebrities. These individuals usually have mental problems such as the man who killed John Lennon.

In this article we’re going to focus on the positives of obsession and how to harness its power to improve your life and the lives of those around you. We’ll also briefly cover the negativities that are brought forth so that you can avoid them.

Let’s begin with the positives and negatives of obsession. Some are pretty obvious, but others are often overlooked or forgotten.

The positives

These are the advantages to being obsessed with something positive; such as success, a business, music, a goal, or even your health.

Focus

Laser focus is what you get with complete obsession. Your mind will not be scattered thinking about a million different things. It will be your obsession and nothing else. With this focus you’ll be learning so much more by immersing yourself in as much information about your obsession as possible.

Persistence

When you’re obsessed, nothing; absolutely nothing is going to get in your way. You’ll find any path around, under, over, or even through those walls and obstacles that appear. Persistence is crucial to any success, and it’s just a side effect of obsession.

Faster results

If every other thought you think and every other action you take pertains to your obsession; think of how fast you can achieve results. What could take years, will take an obsessed person only months.

Quality

You’ll be obsessed with every little detail which will improve the quality of your work.

Quantity

This is one of the only circumstances when quality and quantity will be at almost the same level. The productivity that pertains to your obsession will increase for sure.

The negatives – “too much of a good thing”

There are plenty of negatives to being obsesses over a business, success, or a goal. You must be aware of them before you fall for their traps and let them negatively affect your life.

Less time for family and loved ones

This is the worst side effect of obsession. Less time and enjoyment with those who mean the most to you. You’re so caught up that you’ll keep postponing events and time with them until a later date.

Neglecting other responsibilities

With so much focus on one thing; other responsibilities such as your job will take a back seat. If you’re moon lighting a business or other project, you need to find a balance and remain productive at your daytime occupation until you can support yourself.

Narrow mindedness

Often when you’re obsessed it’s your way or the highway. You shut out everyone else’s ideas, opinions, advice, and criticisms. By doing so, you’ll miss many opportunities and errors.

Burnouts

When you obsess over something every hour of every day, you’re bound to burnout and just get so sick of it. Sometimes so much so that you may never come back to it again.

Now that we know several of the positives and negatives to obsession, let’s move on to some tips on harnessing its power.

Absorb as much info as possible

Use your obsession to learn as much information about one topic as possible. Read every book, magazine, blog post, and article you can. There’s no way you can learn too much about your obsession. Try to always carry reading materials with you that are related to your obsession. Whenever you feel like you’re wasting time at a doctor’s office or on a train, you can keep your mind working and remain productive.

Don’t let your obsession last

One year to one and a half years maximum, should be the duration of your obsession. Even that may be too long. You will yield amazing results in a short time, but as you continue to obsess you’ll miss more and more of the small things that make life enjoyable. Your quality of life will eventually deteriorate; no matter how much money you’ve earned.

Carry a notebook & pen

This is a really simple and cheap way to stay obsessed without missing out on things in your life. Whenever you are trying to enjoy the day with family and friends, bring a notebook with you. Creativity and ideas can strike at anytime. And when they do, you can jot them down and try to forget about them until later and enjoy the present time.

Cultivate a few positive obsessions

By having a few different obsessions you’ll keep yourself from focusing too much on just one of them. This will also give you an opportunity to improve other areas of your life, including your health.

Tackle difficult goals

Obsession gives you everything you need to tackle the biggest of goals. So don’t waste its power on goals that you can easily achieve without it.

Have a selfless obsession

Don’t be selfish with your obsession. Yes, you’re going to have to sacrifice time with the people you care about, but make certain that your obsession is for their greater good, not just yours. Even go bigger, and use your obsession to benefit the world.

Make sure the obsession brings you joy

A positive obsession should bring you happiness. Don’t bother if it doesn’t because you won’t last long enough to yield results.

Obsessions to avoid

Here are a few obsessions that would not be considered as positive:

Obsessed with work - Wasting away your life in a cubicle, pushing papers around.

Obsessing over dieting & exercise – Being healthy and fit is one thing, but exercising for hours a day is an addiction.

Obsessed with a person – Being a celebrity fanatic and knowing Brad Pitt’s favorite color is just ridiculous. Get your own life. And don’t waste your time obsessing over someone who wants nothing to do with you.

Real life examples

There are many individuals who were obsessed with what they were doing which turned out to be a major key to their success.

Thomas Edison – Mr. Edison was completely obsessed with inventing and enjoyed every minute of it. Who knows where the world would be if he wasn’t so obsessed.

Mark Cuban – When Mark Cuban launched is first company MicroSolutions; he would read every computer and software manual he possibly could to learn as much as possible and to stay one step ahead of his competitors. Mark says if you want to start a company it must be an obsession (Please read “A Couple of My Rules for Startups”).

Tiger Woods – To Tiger, golf wasn’t a passion, it was an obsession. He has been playing since he was a small child.

Photo by isaac bowen

Body & Soul | August 20th, 2008 | Published by Andrew Galasetti

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This article was published on Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at 9:00 pm and is filed under Body & Soul. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Harnessing the power of obsession”

Awakening Entrepreneur says:
September 1st, 2008 at 7:46 am
Good one … I also have a related post on the power of obsession (though I call it as dream):
http://www.awakeningentrepreneur.com/blog/2008/09/center-of-entre.html

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