It’s something they can do in their sleep but at least one of them is going to miss. How is it possible that hugely talented and highly-paid stars can miss the vital shot that will bring them glory?

This is a dilemma that men and women have experienced for centuries.

When writing about the pressures of winning an archery contest, the 3rd century BC Taoist writer Chuang-Tzu said that, when we focus on the prize and not the job, we lose the edge to our skill. He said: “An archer shooting for a clay vessel shoots effortlessly, his skill unimpeded. If the prize is changed to an ornament, his hands begin to shake. If it is changed to gold, he squints as if he were going blind. His abilities do not deteriorate, but his belief in them does, as he allows the supposed value of an external reward to cloud his vision.”

Of course, football stars and champion archers aren’t the only ones affected by the prizes of winning.

It’s well-known that the most vulnerable moment in any business negotiation is just before the end, when, perhaps after a long and difficult process, one side sees the prize of an agreement within their reach and relaxes their guard by mentally throwing themselves over the finishing line. As an Indian proverb puts it: “Beware the tiger at the end of the fight.” That’s the moment when, appearing to walk away but sensing his opponent relax, the tiger turns round and makes his strike.

In a negotiation, one of the cleverest ploys that an experienced negotiator can use is the Salami trick. This is when an important concession is refused during the negotiation, but conceded at the end, bit by bit, because the less experienced negotiator relaxes his or her guard. It’s like a salami sausage being given away one slice at a time, until before you know where you are, the whole sausage is gone.

The reason why we fail at the last moment in all these tests is because we become distracted. In short, we lose focus.

When we focus on the task at hand, all our attention is directed on it. We let go of haunting memories from the past and tempting thoughts about the future. We open ourselves to what is happening here and now.

The word “focus” comes directly from the Latin word “focus” meaning a hearth or fire. In pre-electricity days, the fire was in the center of the home. Those lucky enough to have an open fire in their homes today know that moment when on a winter’s evening you can just stare into a roaring log fire or onto the glowing embers and lose yourself in your dreams.

In actual fact, there are two kinds of focus: hard and soft.

Hard focus is the same as concentration or tunnel vision when all you are aware of is what’s in front of you, like a 100-metre athlete looking down his track to the exclusion of everything else.

There are two ways to get into a state of hard focus. One is to be physically still. The other is to remove all the distractions. Once you blot out everything around you, hard focus is what’s left.

Soft focus has a different quality. It’s also known as single-minded immersion, zero-point arousal, and free-flow thinking.

Instead of focusing your thoughts onto your objective in a laser-like way, you expand your awareness in a dream-like way to include your whole environment. You tune in to time and place. You even become aware of yourself in a disassociated way.

A good soft focus exercise is to imagine yourself as a blue feather floating on the wind. There is no destination, no time, no obstacles. You are aware of yourself and enlarge into the sense of freedom and possibilities.

It’s that moment when time stands still and has no more meaning, when hours pass like minutes and minutes like hours.

It’s what Daniel Coleman calls “flow”: a state of forgetfulness, the opposite of rumination and worry. Instead of being lost in nervous pre-occupation, people in flow are so absorbed in the task at hand that they lose all self-consciousness, dropping the small pre-occupations health, bills, even doing well of daily life.

And that’s the secret of focus: doing the job for the sake of it, not for what it leads to.

In their book “Thank God It’s Monday”, Charles Cameron and Suzanne Ellusor describe seeing a Zen monk sweeping snow from the steps of a temple in the middle of a snowstorm. The more it snowed, the more he swept. The monk did not expect to clear the steps of snow or beat the storm. He didn’t expect anything. The simplicity of his actions was enough to make it worth doing, process rather than end result, being rather than completion.

This is what they call “zenning” and it’s at the heart of all success.

There are really only two ways you can fail in any venture. One is to give up. The other is to try too hard. If you’re at the last hurdle, the final straight, or about to take the final shot in a tied game, you simply have to learn to slow down, let go and trust in yourself. That’s when you’ll discover all the energies opening up to you and success will surely be yours.

At their base they are firmly attached to a rock on the riverbed. If they were not securely attached in this way, they would be carried away by the current and would perish.

The upper part of these grasses has absolutely no resistance and is thus free to flow in an infinite variety of movements caused by the river’s ever-changing flow pattern.

A similar type of event may be seen while observing various sea grasses, which are attached to the bottom of the sea and move with the gentle currents and tides.

We have something to learn from these grasses. We can learn the delicate balance between discipline and freedom, between routine and diversity, between control and surrender, between tradition and change. Obviously, too much of any of these opposite qualities will create problems.

On the one hand we need to have discipline, routine, control and tradition to give us a security base, a moral base, a sense of inner strength and stability in facing the ever-changing circumstances of life.

Spiritual disciplines such as prayer, concentration, meditation, proper diet, self-analysis, exercises and breathing techniques help to create that centered feeling of an inner stability and inner security.

Then we can feel free to allow ourselves to flow with life, trusting the Divine, life, others and our own selves; free from the fear of being harmed, overcome or swept off our feet.

The greater our connection with our inner security base, the more spontaneous and free we can allow ourselves to be.

We all need to find our own way of connecting ourselves to the spiritual rock within us, so that we may adjust and cope in a more relaxed way with the ever-changing situations and tests of life.

Be disciplined and flow.

(This small “Parable – Model” is one of over 90 to be found in the forthcoming book “Contemporary Parables” by Robert Elias Najemy.)

Having just come back to reality and work the very next day, I’m able to recognize the hazards of letting myself get all caught up in excess. Another networking event tomorrow evening that will be followed by a photo exhibit at another location. It can get a little crazy if I let it get out of hand. Now this is just my experience and I’m sure there are others who are not concerned one way or the other. There are many who demonstrate excellent self-control in many situations. Their weakness may lie elsewhere. I believe we all have a weak spot in our lives.

At the networking event I learned of a dear friend who is over-working himself. The company is insisting he cut back to no more than 2 hours each day of the weekend. I was suprised and not surprised. This guy is very passionate and committed to excellence. The tragedy is that his truest artist isn’t allowed out to play anymore. I’ve seen some of his work. He’s an incredible artist and that talent is lying dormant crying for release. Our spirit yearns to demonstrate our beauty to the world. This includes the good work he’s doing for his company but not at the expense of the rest of your soul.

Initially, we can completely lose sight of dangers of excess. In the beginning it’s just an exception as it’s a busy week. One week stretches to two or three and before you know it, you’re whole life revolves around work. Or, this week there happened to be more events crammed together, an unusual occurrence. I’m not going to let it get out of hand. But in the past, somewhere along the way, I have lost my sight.I no longer kept my eye on the ball, on the real reason I’m here. How do we express our fullest self?

Everything in moderation. Everything in balance. Trial and error is a good teacher, learning to juggle, to have patience and trust that the things that need to get done will get done, and ability to remember that you have the power to say no. My focus is not on the danger as much as it is on the choice. To recognize when I’m in situations that could backfire. I remind myself to keep my eye on the ball; why am I doing what I’m doing? I want to check-in with my soul and be sure that I haven’t lost sight of my truest passion in life; not just the distractions.

Finally, I don’t need to run from the challenge. I am a physical being. Desire exists to experience life, to experience the textures and tastes, and to learn from a spiritual place. I can dance among the snakes. I can walk on water; the emotional stormy seas of life. The beautiful thing is, so can you! It doesn’t come easy initially. It takes careful observation of oneself, the thoughts and emotions, deciphering their significance, and maintaining a perspective of observer of the experiencer; not from the experiencer perspective. This is a bit of challenge and a fun one at that. To see yourself as something more, you begin to access more. It’s all in the flow and faith.