“You say I should focus my attention. But how do I know what to focus my attention on?”
This is the question a mother of 4 young children and an employer of 120 asked me last week. It’s the kind of question that cuts straight to what matters most, and one that I suspect keeps many of us awake at night.
This woman, whom I’ll call Kendra, had attended my talk on attention management for business leaders. She reached out to me with follow-up questions.
But her questions weren’t about productivity hacks or time-blocking strategies. Instead, Kendra wanted to know if she was focusing on the right things as both a parent and a leader. She essentially told me that she wanted to make sure that at the end of her life, she wasn’t filled with regret because she focused on the wrong things.
Kendra’s questions revealed the universal struggle every driven person faces: How can we make sure we’re spending our limited time and attention on what truly matters?
In our conversation, we explored:
- Why your children don’t need more activities, but need something else entirely
- How protecting yourself actually protects your business (and vice versa)
- The counterintuitive practice that builds your capacity for life satisfaction
Here are some highlights from this coaching call.
The Gift Your Kids Want Most
Kendra’s first question was about her children. “I give as much of my time as I can to my kids. But I’m always thinking, ‘Should I be having them involved in more experiences, like traveling? I have them signed up for martial arts and French.'”
I hear this type of question from parents a lot. We live in a culture that equates more activities with better parenting. But here’s what I’ve observed: As adults in our technology-rich world, we’ve lost the ability to be bored. We reach for our phones while waiting in line, watch videos during hold times, and, yes, we might even check email while playing a game with a child.
The problem? Children are experts at detecting divided attention. When we attempt to multitask around them, everyone loses. We feel guilty and frustrated for trying to juggle competing priorities, while our kids sense that we’re not really present with them.
I told Kendra that just asking that question indicated that she’s a devoted mother, but that most likely her children don’t need more piano lessons or family trips. “They need something much simpler and more powerful,” I said. “They need your full attention when you’re with them.”
Of course, giving undivided attention feels nearly impossible when you’re running a business and managing a household. The constant mental load too often makes presence feel like a luxury entrepreneurs with small children can’t afford.
I’ve heard this same sentiment from many busy professionals, and it’s exactly why I wrote my book, Attention Management: How to Create Success and Gain Productivity Every Day. When we learn to manage our attention intentionally, we can be fully present for the people and moments that matter most—without sacrificing our professional responsibilities.
The Hidden Cost of Being “Always Available”
Kendra’s second struggle hit close to home: “As a business owner, I feel like I have to be always on and always available in case there’s some emergency that my staff needs me to solve.”
This constant availability was bleeding into Kendra’s family time, making it impossible to give her children the undivided attention we’d just discussed. During every dinner, every bedtime story, every weekend moment, Kendra’s brain was anticipating the possibility that she would be interrupted by a work “emergency.”
What is a true emergency?
“Here’s what I want you to consider,” I told Kendra. “What actually constitutes a true emergency in your business? Because I bet there really aren’t that many. And for each scenario, what’s the process for handling it?”
Here’s a useful way to define an emergency in your organization: something that TRULY can’t wait at least a couple of hours. Most “emergencies” aren’t emergencies at all—they’re somewhat time-sensitive issues that feel ‘urgent’ because we’ve trained our teams to see us as the solution to every problem. But here’s the paradox: the more indispensable we make ourselves, the more we limit our business’s growth and our own well-being.
“If you burn out, the organization probably goes away,” I explained to Kendra. “So remember to put your oxygen mask on first.”
Many business owners believe they face a choice: take care of themselves OR take care of their business. But these aren’t competing priorities—they’re the same thing.
Create boundaries around your availability
When you establish clear boundaries around your availability, you create space to think strategically, make better decisions, and take care of yourself, which models sustainable leadership for your team.
“Think about your succession plan,” I added. “No one will want to take over a business that demands 24/7 availability. By creating boundaries now, you’re actually making your company more valuable and attractive to future leaders.”
The solution isn’t just saying “no” more often. Instead, it’s about empowering your team to solve problems without you. I call this approach “mentoring in hindsight,” which means that rather than jumping in to fix every issue, you empower employees to solve challenges independently. Then later, you help them reflect on how they did. This builds their confidence while protecting your time.
I explore this fully in my book Everyone Wants to Work Here. And you can get a taste of my “mentoring in hindsight” approach in this article for Harvard Business Review called “4 Ways Leaders Can Protect Their Time and Empower Their Teams.”
The Practice That Prevents Regret
It was apparent to me that Kendra’s deepest concern—the question that was really driving all her others—was this: “How can I make sure that at the end of my life, I’m not filled with regret about how I spent my time? You said we all get the same 24 hours in a day, so how can I know I’m focusing my attention on the right things?”
I could see this fear beneath everything Kendra had shared. Her impulse to add more activities for her kids, her inability to set work boundaries—both stemmed from a loss of clarity around what was most important. When you’re a business owner with people depending on you for their livelihood, the responsibility of that can make priorities murky.
Satisfaction is about being fully present
I shared with Kendra that most people think the answer is doing more, experiencing more, achieving more.
But in my experience with clients, what I’ve learned is that life satisfaction isn’t about filling every moment with excitement. It’s about being fully present for the moments you’re already living.
“The problem is that our technology-saturated brains have lost the ability to be present. We’re constantly consuming information, always stimulated, never still. To manage our attention intentionally, we actually need to practice the opposite: embracing “boredom.”
“Let me give you an example,” I told her. “My favorite yoga class is called ‘Surrender.’ It’s a stretching class where we hold each stretch pose for five minutes, which feels like an eternity when you’re used to constant stimulation. For the first few minutes, my mind races: my to-do list, conversations I need to have, problems to solve. But somewhere around minute three, something shifts.”
I explained, “The discomfort of the stretch brings my thoughts back to my body. And instead of external focus, I get internal focus. My mind stops thinking, and I start experiencing physical feelings. I start to notice the release of my muscles, the feeling of my breath entering and exiting my body. It’s an experience I could have all the time, but during a busy life, it’s almost impossible to remember. In this yoga class, I almost have no choice.”
The importance of sitting with boredom
The class isn’t just about relaxation. It’s about building the muscle that helps me manage my attention. When we can sit with boredom and stillness instead of immediately reaching for distraction, we build the mental muscle needed to be truly present with our children, our work, our own thoughts.
I explained to Kendra my belief that when you can manage your attention well enough to be fully present, you stop living on autopilot.
You can notice the weight of a child’s hand in yours. The fleeting expression on someone’s face that gives you insight into how they are feeling. Your creativity expands. You have more insights. You catch the moment when a business decision feels aligned with your values. And you begin to become aware of whether you’re spending your days in ways that will matter to you at the end of your life.
That awareness, and your ability to make conscious choices every day, is what prevents regret.
What Kendra Discovered (And What It Means for You)
Kendra’s questions reveal something universal: the fear that we’re missing what truly matters while we’re busy trying to do everything right.
Whether you’re signing your kids up for more activities, staying perpetually available for work “emergencies,” or filling every quiet moment with stimulation, the underlying anxiety is the same: What if I’m not doing the right things?
What I tried to highlight for Kendra was that instead of doing more, she can focus on being more present for what she’s already doing.
The question isn’t whether you have enough time. Instead, it’s whether you’re truly present for the time you have.
If you’re ready to move from reactive distraction to intentional presence so that you can enjoy more of your moments, I can help.
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