Best 268 quotes in «distraction quotes» category

Focus helps you do something. Distraction makes you avoid doing anything.

Focus on one thing and do not scatter your attention

Gen. de Gaulle is only concerned about history, and no jury can dictate the judgment of history." Georges Pompidou

Giving an insignificant thing your attention is a form of self-disrespect.

Goals for the future distract from worry and anger about the past and redirect your focus to the direction you're travelling in.

I am trying not to philosophize. It is un-military. I think I can dig myself out of my academic mind and make an efficient officer.

Have you ever had a dream so strong it slapped you in the face every time you looked away?

Humor and seriousness can be an unstable mix.

Grant made the perfect candidate, a war hero with indistinct views on most political issues.

Idling of our elders is called business; the idling of boys, though quite like it, is punished by those same elders, and no one pities either the boys or the men.

I can't talk about my childhood at all, because cannot say "I" when I mean "we," and if I say "we" it leads to a conversation about how I have a dead sister, instead of what I want to talk about. I found that out in the summer. So I don't talk about it.

If everyone could spend some time self analysing, spend some quiet time with nothing to do and nowhere to go, then without a doubt the world would be an infinitely better place to live and play. It would probably be the cause of the end of bullying, teen suicide, anxiety, depression, stress, and fear and the start of a more genuine and authentic world. I have found that my tranquillity and peacefulness grew significantly stronger as I began to live comfortably with my desires and cravings.

If thou rememberest that thou art going to heaven, thou wilt not sleep on the road. If thou thinkest that hell is behind thee, and the devil pursuing thee, thou wilt not loiter.

If the population is dissatisfied with the condition of society, then the leaders will invariably find a symbolic issue to channel the people’s focus away from any action that threatens the powerful. 'You’re poor? That’s a real shame. Well, look at that rich NFL player who won’t kneel for the national anthem! Doesn’t that disgust you? Aren’t you pissed off about that? Pay no attention to the system that keeps you in poverty, even though you work 40 hours a week and so does your spouse. Instead, focus on Colin Kaepernick not respecting our national theme song and refusing to grovel before our national rag! Don’t be disobedient in your own interest, instead turn on someone being disobedient in his own interest! That’s the American way!' Make no mistake, for the people upset at Colin Kaepernick and other NFL players taking a knee during the national anthem, that fight is a moral issue. They’re genuinely incensed that someone doesn’t show proper respect for the very same country that’s fucking them over, especially when it’s someone who has it better than them. 'What does he have to complain about? He makes 20 million a year! I’m stuck in a shitty job! Fuck him!' No. Fuck the corporation who doesn’t compensate you fairly for your shitty job. Fuck the country that lets them get away with it. And most of all, fuck you for being so easily distracted by symbols and pageantry that you don’t stop to take a look at who your real enemies are.

I have two factories in my mind. One that manufactures bullshit, and another one that buys it.

If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to ­music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don't just stick there scowling at the problem. But don't make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people's words will pour in where your lost words should be. Open a gap for them, create a space. Be patient." [The Guardian, 25 February 2010]

Ignorance is one of the best defense available. Distraction is a remedy.

Hello there, cutie," he drawled. "I thought I smelled you." "How's the leg?" His grin turned a little less friendly, more bared teeth than smile. "Hurt like a son of a b*tch." "Sorry about that." "I bet you are." He stepped closer. I stepped back. "Don't worry," he said. "I forgive you for the leg. I like a little spirit in my fillies." His look sent a shiver through me. "Makes them more fun to break. Now where's that big ox of a boyfriend?" He moved toward me, I sidestepped, leading him away. "You wanna play chase, cutie? I'm really good at it. How about we let your boyfriend and Ramon have their fun while we have ours and—?

Increasingly we confused the pursuit of happiness with the pursuit of pleasure.

Imagining your ideal life success story is LESS about WHAT you want to do and MORE about WHO you want to become.

I'm gonna go put my earplugs in and practice piano for hours until my fingers bleed. I practice the piano with the focus of Helen Keller—and nothing can distract me from the scent of the music. -Karen Quan and Jarod Kintz

I need a drink. Now.” After tossing—fine, throwing—my purse and keys on the couch, I march straight into the kitchen. No more delays; it's time to forget tonight. It’s been yet another night like all the other first dates that never meet a second one. When you begin to lose count, that's when it's really time for a drink. Adrian stands there, leaning against the counter in an unbuttoned dress shirt and dark wash jeans. He glances at me as I walk in. “How was your date?” he asks, taking a swig of his scotch. I brush past him on my mission, opening the cupboard and moving a couple bottles around. I reiterate, “I need alcohol.” Out of the corner of my eye, I catch him hiding a smile before he says, “That bad?” My face twitches as I ignore his line of questioning. It is more like a statement he wants me to clarify, even though he already knows the answer. Instead, I ask, “I have vodka left, don't I?” I stand on my tiptoes in hopes of spotting something in the very back. Nothing. He waltzes over and looks with me, his chin almost touching my shoulder. “I think you polished that one off after last week's date.” His voice is low right next to my ear, very nearly causing a shiver.

I needed a distraction. A drink, a good tumble, anything—even this sure-to-be- trouble punk show.

I needed something to distract me-anything far away from my parents’ drama-just for a second. And when I saw my chance I didn’t stop to think about how much I’d regret it later. An opportunity sat on the bar stool beside me, and I lunged at it. Literally. I kissed Wesley Rush. One second his hand lay on my shoulder, and his gray eyes rested, for once, on my face, and the next my mouth was on his. My lips were fierce with bottled emotion, and he seemed to tense, his body frozen in shock. That didn’t last very long. An instant later, he returned the aggression, his hands flying to my sides and pulling me toward him. It felt like a battle between our mouths. My hands clawed into his curly hair, tugging it way harder than necessary, and his fingertips dug into my waist. It worked better than punching someone would have. Not only did it help me release the agonizing pressure, but it definitely distracted me. I mean, it’s hard to think about your dad when you’re making out with somebody. And as disturbing as it sounds, Wesley was a really good kisser. He leaned into me, and I tugged at him so hard that he nearly fell off his bar stool. In that moment, we just couldn’t get close enough to each other. Our separate seats seemed like they were miles apart. All of my thoughts vanished, and I became a sort of physical being. Emotions disappeared. Nothing existed but our bodies, and our warring lips were at the center of everything. It was bliss! It was amazing not to think. Nothing! Nothing… until he screwed it up.

In such an admirable position of the New World, man has no other enemy than himself.

In politics, nothing good ever comes from the unexpected.

I regarded homework as a form of torture that the teachers would unleash on me.

I should have learned mindfulness, and it’s too late now because it’s no good learning it when you’re already in crisis: you have to start when things are good. But only the very, very oddest would think, Hey, my life is perfect. I know! I’ll sit and waste twenty minutes Observing My Thoughts without Judgement.

Is daydreaming a distraction from work, or work a distraction from daydreaming?

Is everybody in? Is everybody in? Is everybody in? The ceremony is about to begin. The entertainment for this evening is not new, you've seen this entertainment through and through you have seen your birth, your life, your death....you may recall all the rest. Did you have a good world when you died? -enough to base a movie on??

It's only fiction until it happens.

It must be emphasized that hygge entails commitment to the present moment and a readiness to set distractions aside.

It's alright to keep and open mind, but at a certain point—once you have thoroughly completed your homework—you have to learn how to stop and focus on intensely and passionately executing these goals step by step. You have to repel the distractions.

Meanwhile, the extraordinary measures we take to stay abreast of each minuscule change to the data stream end up magnifying the relative importance of these blips to the real scheme of things. Investors trade, politicians respond, and friends judge based on the micromovements of virtual needles. By dividing our attention between our digital extensions, we sacrifice our connection to the truer present in which we are living. The tension between the faux present of digital bombardment and the true now of a coherently living human generated the second kind of present shock, what we're calling digiphrenia—digi for "digital," and phrenia for "disordered condition of mental activity.

I was quite possibly in the midst of losing my mind. I needed to get away from people until I figured out if I actually was losing my mind.

Maybe you get caught up in the little things because you are really trying to distract yourself from having to deal with the big things. Maybe it's avoidance.

Most people are too busy thinking to notice what's going on right in front of their eyes.

More voices means less trust in any given voice.

My insanity begged for a distraction. (Eric)

Murder was a fascination as always.

One cannot underestimate boredom as an incentive to write.

My temptation is to tackle everything at once, or nothing at all.

One man's distraction is another man's refuge.

Nothing calms an anxious mind like a little mindless entertainment.

Nothing distracts one from one's true purpose in life more than following the crowd mentality.

On your way to accomplish greatness, you will hear a lot of noise. Listen to your inner voice and never let the distraction of the crowd discolour your poise.

Our digital devices and the outlooks they inspired allowed us to break free of the often repressive timelines of our storytellers, turning us from creatures led about by future expectations into more fully present-oriented human beings. The actual experience of this now-ness, however, is a bit more distracted, peripheral, even schizophrenic than that of being fully present. For many, the collapse of narrative led initially to a kind of post-traumatic stress disorder—a disillusionment, and the vague unease of having no direction from above, no plan or story. But like a dose of adrenaline or a double shot of espresso, our digital technologies compensate for this goalless drifting with an onslaught of simultaneous demands. We may not know where we're going anymore, but we're going to get there a whole lot faster. Yes, we may be in the midst of some great existential crisis, but we're simply too busy to notice.

Our enslavement to distraction inhibits our action.

Our feelings of anxiety are genuine but confused signals that something is amiss, and so need to be listened to and patiently interpreted -- processes which are unlikely to be completed when we have to hand, in the computer, one of the most powerful tools of distraction ever invented. The entire internet is in a sense pornographic, a deliverer of a constant excitement that we have no innate capacity to resist, a seducer that leads us down paths that for the most part do nothing to answer our real needs.

Our moral frailty is a strange consolation.