James Black Quotes

The habits of study in which I have been brought up have done much to support me. I never allow myself to be one moment unoccupied.

Nothing is more dangerous than to stop working. It is a habit that can soon be lost, one that is easily neglected and hard to resume. A measure of day-dreaming is a good thing, like a drug prudently used ... But too much submerges and drowns. Woe to the intellectual worker who allows himself to lapse wholly from positive thinking into day-dreaming. He thinks he can easily change back, and tells himself that it is all one. He is wrong! To substitute day-dreaming for thought is to confuse poison with a source of nourishment.

Don't wait for a more convenient day to discipline your mind!

Always staying focused is something that's been very tough for me. I'm still working on it.

Good performance is about the capacity to focus and concentrate.

There are always distractions, if you allow them.

Concentration is my motto - first honesty, then industry, then concentration.

One way to boost our will power and focus is to manage our distractions instead of letting them manage us.

I always had a sense of discipline in me. However, there was a time when I couldn't divide my time properly between off-field things and on-field assignments. The focus would be missing at times, and that would affect my preparation for matches. I managed to change that.

When you play, play hard; when you work, don't play at all.

The more you focus, the more that focus becomes a habit.

I'm a higgledy-piggledy person in every way. On days that I work, I work for eight hours in a row, with my internet access entirely turned off, locked in my office.

I learned that focus is key. Not just in your running a company, but in your personal life as well.

I learned to discipline myself to do things I didn't want to do.

I can handle a lot of work. I've always been able to. I'm a very focused individual. I come to my studio at about 7:30 in the morning and exit almost 5:00 P.M. In that time, those eight or nine hours, it's kind of laser focus on whatever I'm working on. There aren't really any distractions or anything.

I am a disciplined person. When I am writing, I write for 7-8 hours.

Meditation is a lifelong process. Give it a try. As you get deeper and more disciplined into the process, you'll get deeper and more disciplined in your mind and life.

When things aren't working out, we have a tendency to say, 'Go do other things,' but you shouldn't do other things. You need to stay at your desk and continue to try to write. You need to insist on it.

Talent without discipline is like an octopus on roller skates. There's plenty of movement, but you never know if it's going to be forward, backwards, or sideways.

But above that, most mature adults can hold their attention on something for 45 minutes, whether they like it or not. But above that requires training.

When I work I am pure as an angel tiger and clear is my eye and hot my brain and silent all the whining grunting piglets of the appetites.

I was born with an ability to concentrate very hard on a job for a long time.

I was a terrible student. Still, I managed to get into college, but my daydreaming threatened to sabotage me. I used behavior modification to break the cycle. I started by setting an arbitrary time limit on studying: for every 15 minutes of study, I'd allow myself an hour of daydreaming. I set the alarm.

The ability to concentrate and to use time well is everything.

Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.