Meditation Practice - XI

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Concentration (This is an exercise in pure awareness)

 

Choose one sense object for a basic object of attention. It is

suggested that you choose either the sensations in one part of your

body of your breathing or the sounds around you.

 

Focus your attention on this object, but do so in such a way that if

your attention shifts to something else you are immediately aware of

the shift.

 

Let us suppose you have chosen for your basic object of attention

your breathing. Well, then, concentrate on your breathing.... It is

quite likely that after a while your attention will move to something

else—a thought, a sound, a feeling.... Now provided you are aware of

this shift of attention to something else, this shift is not to be

counted as a distraction. It is important, however, that you be aware

of the shift while the shift is taking place or immediately after it

has taken place. Count it a distraction only if you become aware of

the shift long after it has taken place.

 

Suppose you choose breathing as your basic object of attention. Then

your exercise will possibly go something like this:—

 

" I am breathing.... I am breathing.... Now I am thinking....

thinking.... thinking.... Now I am listening to a sound....

listening.... listening.... Now I am irritated.... irritated. Now I

feel bored.... bored.... bored.... "

 

In this exercise, the wandering of the mind is not considered a

distraction provided you are aware that your attention is shifting to

some other object.... Once you have become aware of this shift, stay

with the new object (thinking, listening, feeling....) for a while,

then return to the basic object of your attention (breathing)....

your skill in self-awareness may become so great that you will not

only become aware of the shift of your attention on to some object,

but even of the desire to shift, the impulse in you to shift on to

something else. As when you want to move your hand you will first

become conscious of the desire arising within you to move the hand,

your consent to this desire, your carrying out of this desire, the

very first stirring of your hand.... All of which activities are

performed in an infinitesimal fraction of a second and so we find it

impossible to distinguish one from the other until the silence and

stillness within us has become almost total and our awareness has

acquired razor edge sharpness. Self-awareness is a powerful means for

increasing in love of God and of neighbour. The self-awareness

heightens the love. The love, when it is genuine, fosters deeper self-

awareness.

 

Do not go in search of abstruse means for developing your self-

awareness. Begin with humble things like the awareness of the feel of

your body or awareness of the things around you and then more on to

exercises like the ones which are suggested here and it won't be long

before you notice the fruits of peacefulness and love that heightened

self-awareness brings with it.