Meditation of the week :What You Attend To Is What You Get

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Meditation of the week from cybermonks

http://www.interluderetreat.com/

 

What You Attend To Is What You Get

 

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“For the moment, what we attend to is reality.”

William James

 

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In a lecture recently, Alan Wallace, American scholar and Tibetan monk

proposed that, “If you were to write an essay on the nature of the

world, it would be full of what you are attending to.” Our minds are

full of what we pay attention to. What we do not attend to still

exists, but for us it may as well not.

 

The baseball World Series demonstrates this. For some fans, the World

Series is the important event in the fall. It fills their minds and

determines their emotions. They watch the games, read about them, talk

to their friends about them and relive key moments in memory. Other

people have absolutely no interest in baseball, and if you mention the

World Series they are likely to respond, “Oh, is that happening again?”

The competition exists, but for them it might as well not. It plays no

significant part in the world they construct in consciousness.

 

What we give our attention to becomes our reality. If we focus on the

unfairness of the world, its dangerousness, and the evil in it, that

becomes what we know. If we add to that a belief in our own

powerlessness, we have a recipe for depression. We get the emotions

that go with the objects of our attention.

 

A popular way to connect with others is to play “Ain’t it awful?” We

share our views of the bad weather, the bad politics, the latest

disaster in the news, the bad boss, the bad people who aren't like us

so we have something to talk about. We may be miserable, but at least

we have a connection with the other players in the conversation. The

trouble is, we have all that bad stuff crowding our minds and our view

of our world torments us.

 

If we focus our attention on all the evil-doers, we may miss the

good-doers. We can begin to think that it really is a dog eat dog

world, that nobody cares, and what's the point of going on anyway? If

we spend our time watching TV news, crime dramas and “reality” shows,

we may begin to experience the world as dominated by evil and stupid

people. The wise and kind are a no show in our reality.

 

We have the ability to shift attention consciously. We can focus on the bleak or

we can choose to focus on the uplifting. We need not passively accept all the

input that comes to us. We can change the channel, hit the delete key, or

introduce a new topic of discussion. We can also be conscious of our own

thoughts and pick and choose to which of them we give energy.

 

 

Practice:

 

Take time to think about what habitually holds your attention. Is your

attention dominated by thoughts of sports, entertainment, the news,

politics, your kids, your job, food, your health, your appearance,

money, possessions, sex, your feelings, or some other collection of

mental images?

 

Contemplate how the focus of your attention affects both your

perception of the world, and how you feel.

 

Be mindful of your focus and change it when it is directed at something that is

likely to diminish your well-being.

 

Sitting quietly. Think of all the people doing good in the world. Bring to mind

the helpers, the teachers, the healers, the relief workers--the people who enact

their compassion. Remember all those who relieve suffering.

 

Make it a habit to return your thoughts to the compassionate wish that

all beings be free from suffering.