Getting Attention Requires Doing Something; Capturing Attention Requires Giving Something - Grasshopper

There is a large difference between getting and capturing attention. The difference lies between give and take.

You take attention, albeit shortly, when you do something with the sole purpose of getting someone’s attention. That often means doing something out of the ordinary to turn someone’s head. Whether the head stays turned depends on what you do next.

 

In order to sustain attention, you have to give attention.

 

Giving attention is a proven way of capturing long-term attention.

 

If you stop paying attention to something - your house, your health, a business, a friendship, a job, a relationship, it begins to fall apart. Giving attention is nature’s glue.

 

Is there something slipping away from you? If so, chances are it needs your attention.

 

Attention cannot be set and forgotten; otherwise things and people that are taken for granted may soon be granting someone else’s wishes.

 

Receiving attention is an elixir for most of us but we are quite often not willing to pay the price - giving attention.

 

My friend Jerry Stocking has a great exercise for the giving and receiving of attention. He simple asks you to put your attention on something - anything. Then he requests that you imagine that something or someone is giving attention to you, making you the object of attention. This exercise puts you in the practice of giving and receiving attention, rather than getting stuck in one mode.

 

Getting someone’s attention can be thought of as the headline of an article. It may grab your attention, but not sustain and capture it if the body of the story doesn’t give attention to details that are important to you.

 

Start to notice what is losing your attention and find out if it’s a candidate worth giving your attention to. Doing so may save your job, your relationship or your life.

 

All the best,

John