Attention

 “Do stuff.  Be clenched, curious. Not waiting for inspiration's shove or society's kiss on your forehead.  Pay attention.  It's all about paying attention.  Attention is vitality.  It connects you with others.  It makes you eager.  Stay eager.” -  Susan Sontag

"Attention (prosoche) is the fundamental Stoic spiritual attitude. It is a continuous vigilance and presence of mind, a self-consciousness which never sleeps, and a constant tension of the spirit. Thanks to this attitude, the philosopher is fully aware of what he does at each instant, and he wills his actions fully. Thanks to this spiritual vigilance, the Stoic always has "at hand" (procheiron) the fundamental rule of life: that is, the distinction between what depends on us and what does not." p. 84

Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault.By Pierre Hadot.  Edited with an introduction by Arnold Davidson.  Translated by Michael Chase.  Malden, Massachusetts, Wiley-Blackwell, 1995.  Index, extensive bibliography, 320 pages.  ISBN: 978-0631180333.  VSCL.

"Everywhere and at all times, it is up to you to rejoice piously at what is occurring at the present moment, to conduct yourself with justice towards the people who are present here and now, and to apply rules of discernment to your present representations, so that nothing slips in that is not objective."
- Marcu Aurelius, Meditations