Quick! A laser is a beam of coherent light, but what does the name itself stand for?
Answer: Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation (mouse-over)

Lasers can zap skin discolorations, whiten teeth and read the bar-codes on your groceries. They can cut through steel. Medical applications and industrial processes aside, lasers are awesome, and while waiting for light-sabers to become available, one has to understand that a laser's real power lies not just in the pretty lights it produces, but in the principle that makes it work: coherence. Lasers are coherent light. Flashlights can't cut through anything but shadows, after all.

So what does it mean for something to be coherent, to possess coherence? A lot of terms get tossed around in the resulting scramble: "possessing internal consistency, a : systematic or logical connection or consistency , b : integration of diverse elements, relationships, or values..."

Possessing coherence in communication for example, is having orderly, logical sub-ideas radiating from a central idea. If you've ever had to go through outlining an essay in English class, it's like that. Try thinking of yourself as a spider -- an intelligence in the center of a web created of interlocking and related ideas. Even as the real spiders can spin webs of simply remarkable beauty where each connection made just so, coherence can make the connections between ideas beautiful in their clarity.

It's the difference between a labyrinth and a spider web. You don't get lost visually when looking at a spider web. When this happens, wherever you end up, you can just latch on one idea that radiates from the center and use it to get back to the heart of the entire web.

Coherence gets to the point. Coherence radiates from the core.

Coherence in communication
Take a look at the following passage:


As opposed to this:


It's shorter, but still the same idea gets through. The heart of the message is still there. That's an example of coherence in that whatever medium or word choice, the point of the message is clear enough, sharp enough, to strike home. Ahem --"cutting through steel", anyone? Coherence cuts through vagueness and wishy-washy words. Coherence adds to clarity.

It's a sure bet that you already experienced this: getting dragged into a long, rambling debate which left you wanting to chew your arm off so you can get away. Or mask a sigh and mentally plead, "Can you get to the point, please?"

Popular advice calls for the rule of three in communication to fend off situations like this. In an argument, you're advised to stick to three points in descending order, so if you fail on the first, you have two more to fall back on. Even in email, three bullets points, remember? The wisdom behind this lays it out as three things, max, can stick to short-term memory, anything more tends to slide off the plate (unless you write it all down). Then it's out of sight, out of mind.

Old proverbs bear this out too: Talk from one mouth, listen with both ears. Which translates to: give input, and keep your ears open for longer than you've talked so you can draw and absorb all the relevant information coming in at you, not just wait for the other person to take a breath just so you can have your say again... Which leads to the next idea.

Coherence in focus
2 words, 2 syllables each. The first clue is already obvious. You get it already? No?
Here: Laser focus (mouse-over)

If you focus on something, then it follows that there is more of you present there, in that moment to pay attention to that something -- like a full-body experience fixed on one thing. How many times have you made a mistake because you weren't fully present? Ever done stuff automatically then shift into a split-second of "OK, what the hell just happened?" followed by, "Oh, dammit!"?

We each have an individual set point for focus, energy, and attention. The Pomodoro technique (PDF) breaks time down to 30-minute slices, 25 minutes for work, 5 minutes for a quick break, and a longer break after a certain number of "Pomodoros". Scientists believe we have around 90 minutes or so before our brains get tired of the activity we've been focusing on. When we have just so much set reliable energy and attention to spend in a day, how can we manage laser focus?

• Reduce and eliminate distractions. Put first things first. Know what to put first.
  
• Time yourself at an important activity. If you only have 25 minutes' worth of focus, don't waste it on Solitaire.
• When the time is over, stretch, get up, maybe eat a little something to boost flagging energy levels, or do something to get the blood pumping and your brain oxygenated. Have a break. Drown an Oreo in the drink of your choice. Focus on something else.
  

Coherence in purpose
Face it, not everyone has a burning mission to change the world. There are lot of us on this pretty blue planet (7 billion at the last count) and if you plot us out on one of those fancy graphs, it's a pretty sure bet that the people with burning missions are a small, a very small percent of the entire population. Hitler had a mission. So did Gandhi and Mother Teresa. And those three people's influence changed the world. So...how about you? What's your intent here? What's your life's meaning? What's your purpose? What do you want yuor life to mean while you're here?

Wrap up:
Cultivating coherence your life means applying it to, and from, your core values. Everything comes from the core, the source, and when you get knocked around enough by life to learn how vital and important it is to live truthfully from your deepest values, your learn how "to keep it together." Knowing this doesn't guarantee that  you'd change "The World", but living out this knowledge will change yours.