The Power Of Attention

Attention is a key element of mindfulness and other meditation practices, often reffered to as psychic energy. Let us ask ourselves, 'Where am I putting my psychic energy?" Am I putting it into worrying, distraction, craving, judgment? Or, into cultivating joy, gratitude, love, or other beneficial qualities? This meditation invites a strengthening of the power of attention, by shifting awareness from one meditation object to another, 'changing the channel,' in order to help us cultivate a state of mind and heart that support happiness and wellbeing.

Transcript

This meditation focuses on cultivating the power of attention.

The Hungarian-American psychologist who first researched and wrote about flow states,

These are highly focused,

Optimal states of well-being,

Mihai,

Csikszentmihalyi,

Spoke about attention,

Which is a key element of mindfulness,

As psychic energy.

So it's a very good question to ask ourselves,

Where am I putting my psychic energy?

Into worrying,

Ruminating,

Being angry or distracted?

Or am I putting my attention,

My psychic energy,

Into being aware,

Being present,

Being kind to myself and others,

Being grateful,

Opening to life as it is?

This meditation helps build our capacity to focus attention.

This helps us to see how to untangle ourselves from painful mind states and emotions,

And how to cultivate more beneficial ones.

I just invite you to find a posture that's comfortable and relaxed.

So just make sure that your back is straight,

So if you can relax your shoulders.

You can let your hands rest wherever is comfortable in your lap or on your knees or on your thighs.

Letting your eyes gently close,

Again if that's comfortable to you,

Or if you want to you can keep them open with a soft,

Unfocused gaze.

Just let the chest be open so you can breathe easily.

And just feel the body here,

Let yourself arrive.

Sometimes we arrive in the body,

But our mind is still kind of a little way behind,

We haven't yet arrived,

So let the mind and the body come together.

Just feeling your body here on the seat.

Be feeling the weight of your body pushing down on your seat,

On your thighs.

Sensations of the feet in contact with the floor.

Feeling of your hands touching your lap or one hand,

Touching the other or your legs.

Just feeling the sensations,

See if you can just feel them from the inside.

Just sensing just how it feels to be here.

Just letting yourself arrive and settle.

Just contacting your breath,

Just noticing that,

Noticing is the breath tight or more relaxed.

And it can be helpful to begin a meditation with a few deeper,

Fuller breaths.

So I'd invite you to just take a nice,

Deep,

Full inhalation.

Filling the lungs,

Filling the chest.

And then a long,

Slow out-breath,

Releasing,

Letting go as you breathe out.

And again,

Nice,

Full,

Deep in-breath.

And a long,

Slow out-breath.

You might imagine you're breathing out any stresses,

Any busyness,

Or tension from the day.

Just letting it go.

And as you breathe in deeply again,

You might invite in a quality of calm to the body and the mind.

Breathing in,

Breathing out.

Breathing in,

Calming the body.

And breathing out,

Calming the mind.

You might take another full breath or two.

And whenever you're ready,

Just let the breath settle back into its natural rhythm.

Just letting it be as it is right now.

Breathing in.

Breathing out.

And as you come back to the breath,

See if you can bring a kind attention to whatever is present right now for you.

Noticing how the body feels,

Noticing if there's any tightness or tension in the mind,

Maybe busyness.

Whatever's here,

Just meeting it with kindness.

If the mind goes off,

Just gently,

Kindly come back again to this,

Where we are right now.

And you might invite a smile or a half smile to your face,

Just activating the muscles at the corners of the mouth,

The corners of the eyes.

You might find it helpful to think of a loved one or somebody who's dear to you,

Somebody who easily makes you feel happy or joyful.

Maybe a child or a grandchild or a pet or a dear friend or loved one.

And the smile can help us soften,

Just let go of any holding or tension.

Inviting,

If you can,

If it's accessible right now,

Inviting a smile.

And in the coming minutes,

I'm going to invite you to bring awareness to different aspects of your experience.

And any time you find yourself caught up in thinking,

Maybe thinking about what you're going to do later or something that happened earlier or things happening in the world,

Let your attention come back to where we are,

Where we are in the practice at that time.

No problem when the mind goes off,

But just having the intention of being here and coming back.

You can begin by just bringing awareness to your breathing,

Just as it is,

For perhaps three breaths or four or five breaths,

Just aware of the sensations of breathing.

Feeling the breath as you breathe in and as you breathe out.

Sensing the breath,

Breathing in,

Breathing out.

Now I'm going to invite you now to shift your attention.

You might think of it as like the way we can change the channel on a radio.

Maybe we can move from rock music to classical music to the news,

Just consciously shifting attention in the same way.

So just letting your awareness now come to your bodily sensations.

Just feeling whatever sensations,

Maybe it's pressure or heat or coolness or tightness,

Heaviness,

Softness.

Just noticing what's present right now,

Different parts of the body,

Different bodily experiences.

And again,

Perhaps three to five different bodily experiences,

Just bringing your attention to these.

And allow yourself to feel them,

Not just to notice and move on,

But feel the sensations.

If it's in the feet,

Tingling or pulsing,

Just feel those sensations.

Let them come,

Let them go.

And again,

If the mind goes off,

Just bring it back to these sensations of the body.

And again,

When you're ready,

You might shift the channel.

The channel again,

Change the channel,

Channel again.

Letting your attention now come to sounds.

Just coming into the stream of sounds.

Letting your awareness open to sound.

The close in sounds,

More distant sounds,

Just letting the attention focus closely on sounds.

Maybe in the same way,

Just get in contact with three or four or five different sounds.

And allow yourself to take them in.

Just be aware of the experience of opening to sound.

Just noticing if the mind moves off,

Get caught up in thought.

Just gently come back to the sound,

Opening to sound.

Maybe sounds inside your own body,

Inside the ear,

Sounds in the room,

Sounds from outside.

Just letting the attention,

This psychic energy,

Focus on this channel,

If you like,

Or the stream of sound.

Again,

If you feel ready,

Just letting the attention shift to another area of our sense experience.

Or the experience of emotions and mind states.

Noticing if you're feeling happy or sad,

Or bored,

Disconnected,

Excited,

Calm,

Distracted.

Just noticing how these emotions,

Mind states.

See how it is to bring awareness to them.

And notice whatever is present and let yourself experience them.

Letting them come,

Letting them be,

Letting them go.

If you become aware of feeling,

Let's say,

Of sadness,

Notice what makes that up.

Maybe feelings around the heart,

Around the eyes,

Maybe some thoughts coming.

Just in a kind and non-judging way,

Just be aware of this feeling or this emotion.

What's present right now?

What are you aware of in this particular area of attention?

And meeting whatever is arising,

Whatever is present with kindness,

With acceptance,

Without judgment.

Not seeing anything as being wrong or other than it should be.

Just whatever is here,

Kind,

Non-judging awareness.

Just moving into a kind of a last turning of the shifting of the channel.

It might bring your awareness to thoughts.

In not consciously thinking anything.

But just being aware when thoughts come up as much as you can.

See how it is to bring awareness to thoughts.

And you could think of this awareness as being like a shepherd watching over her sheep.

Not needing to do anything until one starts wandering off and then gently and kindly bringing it back.

So not doing deliberate or conscious thinking,

But just aware of thought when it does arise.

So here just an open receptive awareness.

There's opening particularly to the stream of thoughts when it comes up,

When thoughts arise.

And if you find you're caught up in a story without even being aware of going there,

Just again kindly and gently bring your awareness back to this.

Receptive attention,

This receptive awareness.

Just for the next couple of minutes,

If you'd like to just consciously move your attention to one of the other areas,

Maybe to the body or to the breath.

And just get used to this conscious shifting of attention.

Becoming really familiar with the way we can move our attention.

We can step out of our stories and our plans and all the kind of thought stream and we can let our attention rest in any of these areas and others as well.

What we're seeing,

What we're tasting and smelling,

We could use that as well if we chose to.

And as we move into the final few minutes of this meditation,

You might choose one of these channels if you like,

One of these focuses of attention and let your awareness rest there on the breath or on bodily sensations or sounds or emotions or on this open awareness of thought.

Just let the attention rest in one of these areas.

Let that be your focus or your home base.

Okay.

Okay.

And then you become aware that your attention has moved into thinking.

You find you're planning something you're going to do later or thinking about the past or solving a problem or just caught up in daydreams.

Whatever kind of thinking you get pulled into,

Just gently and kindly let your attention come back to your home base,

What you're resting your attention on,

Gently coming back.

Okay.

I'd like to finish this meditation with a poem by Wendell Berry.

The poem is called,

I Go Among Trees.

Then what is afraid of me comes and lives a while in my sight.

What it fears in me leaves me and the fear of me leaves it.

It sings and I hear its song.

Then what I am afraid of comes.

I live for a while in its sight.

What I fear in it leaves it and the fear of it leaves me.

It sings and I hear its song.

After days of labor,

Mute in my consternations.

I hear my song at last and I sing it.

As we sing,

The day turns,

The trees move.

Reviews

I like the changing of the channels metaphor.

Thank you 💚 have to return bc I sorta fell asleep halfway haha

Hugh Byrne's meditations have a wonderfully calming effect on my soul. Thank you Mr. Byrne.

Thank you for reminding me of the basics of meditation, tuning into different channels away from the planing of the future or the remeberance of the past.

Deeply connecting to whole experience of body mind and heart. Thank you 🙏

Very powerful, the finishing bell was not intrusive and allowed be to go deeper into my meditation than usual. Hugh’s gentle and familiar voice engenders peaceful feelings of safety and belonging that I have longed for. 🙏🏼🕊🔔💫

Thank you Hugh, this was do helpful in reminding me that I can chose my focus as opposed to letting wild horses drag me off in all directions.

That was a precious meditation. Just lovely and effective. Thank you,

Great guiedance. Thank you.

This is a very good practice for me. Thank you.

💙Hugh meditation always 5 atar

Serendipitous that this was featured today. I was just reflecting on a long history of having a very scattered, grasshoppery sort of mind. A very good practice to work with. The non-judgment and kindness reminders are very helpful to the process.
🙏🌸🙇‍♀️

Instructive. Learning to focus on whatever is present. Thank you.

Wonderful, as always...

Shifting attention to different things was insightful for me. It is possible to shift from negative emotion to something more pleasant. Thank you. I feel calm and peaceful after this meditation 🧘‍♀️

That was fantastic. In shifting my awareness through different points of focus I developed this keen awareness that what I was experiencing, what I was feeling, or thinking, and who I am are different things. The consciousness within me observing these experiences and the experiences themself are not one and the same, and I can approach whatever it is that arises without being caught up in its story. The stillness that perceives all of it remains unchanged. There was a point where i started trying to identify“where” I was located. Am “i” in my body or was i just experiencing it, am “i” in my thoughts or was I merely directing my attention to observing them. It’s difficult to explain but during the practice there was this deep sense of understanding that did not need to be put into words.

The poem was the perfect way to end it. Thank you for this.

Marvelous, thank you!

Wonderful! Definitely helps to come back to NOW during meditation. Love the poem at the end. I will listen to this often as I strengthen my focus and attention. Thank you so much!

I didn’t make Meditation this morning in DC (chose a moving meditation on the C&O instead😊) yet this was a wonderful practice of mindfulness and mind training- in addition to a hit of Hugh 👏🏼 I’m ready for a great week 🙏🏼Namaste