Hi everyone,
Welcome to this meditation for focus and concentration.
You may be feeling a little bit scattered or if you just like to strengthen the muscle of focusing on one thing at a time,
I've got you.
Let's get started.
All right,
Let's come to a comfortable position.
And as we talked about in the last practice,
There's not one specific shape that you need to take.
If you feel comfortable sitting,
Sit.
If you feel more comfortable lying down,
That works too.
Closing the eyes,
Let's go inside.
Moving the attention from an external focus to an internal one.
And we'll start by just assessing what's here.
What's here in the mind,
What's present in our body,
And what's present in the heart.
So identify now an anchor for the rest of the practice.
An anchor is something that can help ground you as you practice.
Sometimes it's something that you can continue to bring your mind back to once it gets distracted.
So a very common anchor taught in meditation is the breath.
So you'll often find teachers will guide you to bring your attention back to your in-breaths and your out-breaths.
I like having a variety of anchors to choose from.
Different techniques will resonate at different times.
And so you might play with the sensation of your hands in your lap,
Or perhaps the weighted feeling of the feet on the earth.
Another one of my favorite anchors is sound.
You can practice bringing your attention to what you can hear around you.
And you might be surprised by all the sounds that we're surrounded by,
But we often tune out.
So it's not a problem if the mind gets distracted and carried away with the thought.
That's extremely natural.
And the practice of meditation is strengthening that skill of noticing where your mind is and bringing it back with kindness and firmness.
So sometimes I'll hear people say,
I can't meditate.
My mind is all over the place.
But that in a way is meditation.
Noticing that your mind is all over the place and then continually bringing it back to the anchor.
That is mindfulness.
And the more you practice,
The easier you'll find as you move throughout your day to have a clear mind and to focus or concentrate on the task at hand.
Because as you're focusing,
As distractions pop up,
Or you remember something else that you were supposed to do,
You've already developed that muscle to bring your mind back to the task at hand.
And as you and as you find yourself getting caught up in a thought,
Acknowledge it and come right back.
Just like doing reps in the gym,
Practicing the action of coming back to the present moment.
And as we come to the end of today's meditation for focus and concentration,
Let go of your focused attention and instead open your awareness to your entire body,
Your entire current experience.
Thank you so much for meditating with me today.
I hope you're feeling just a little bit mentally stronger.
And don't forget to let me know what you thought of today's practice in the comments,
And I'll see you next time.
