Mindful Focusing
“X Marks the Spot” by Jerry Gelbart, M.D.
(Script from video. 2 Exercises at end of video)
A basic mindfulness practice is to create an intention to focus on your breath for a set length of time. Once you start, you try to stay focused on your breath, notice when your mind wanders away and gently bring your attention back to your breath. X is your breath. X marks the spot. Where is your mind and where do you want it to be?
If I asked you to take a breath in, follow it down with your mind and stay focused on the sensation of your breath, for one in-breath and one out-breath, you probably could stay focused on that. But if I ask you to do it for 5 or 10 minutes your mind would likely wander.
The wandering mind can be very frustrating to beginners new to meditation. Many people who try meditation give up prematurely, because they think if they can’t stay focused then they cannot meditate. Just the opposite! Accepting the wandering as normal and not judging it changes everything!
Neuroplasticity
If we accept that it is the nature of the mind to wander, we are on our way. There’s so much we can train our mind to do. It requires patience, intention, attention, wandering away, focusing and refocusing. We accept the tendency of our mind to get distracted, to judge, go into the past, and future trip.
I think everyone wants to learn how to stay focused. To focus on what we want to focus on and also not focus on what we don’t want to focus on. If you understand the concept of brain plasticity, it means that over time we can change our brain. Just like we can work on our body to change its shape we can train and change our brain.
By taking some time to practice and train your brain you will see long term results. Brain imaging studies demonstrate the physiological and anatomic changes that occur over a 6-month period of mindfulness training. When I was in college, I ridiculed my friends who meditated. I think I had to be hit with a sledgehammer to see the benefits.
In a moment I'm going to describe and then demonstrate a very simple exercise. This simple exercise can be the opening to a deep well of understanding that can lead to dramatic changes.
I’m going to take a single breath in, then out. Nothing complicated or fancy. No counting, no box breathing, no figuring out if I’m doing diaphragmatic breathing or not. No thinking. Simply follow the breath with my mind, in, and down, then up and out. Just feel it. One breath. Like this: (see video)
Ok, now you try. Eyes closed or open, focus on the feeling of the air going in through your mouth or nose, down into your lungs, then breath out, feel it come up and out your mouth or nose.
What happens when you do that? It clears your mind as you feel the breath. I call it going into “sensory mode” and tracking the sensation. It’s not very hard to do that for 1 breath, but what would happen if I asked you to keep doing that for a few minutes? Likely your mind would start to wander.
It is much more difficult to maintain our focus for more than a brief moment. The exercises teach us how to extend our focusing over longer and longer periods, and how to apply that new superpower all day in every way.
I love the metaphor about training our brain is like training a puppy. When you first bring home a puppy and you want to train it to sit, you place it on a spot on the floor, and say “sit.” You watch what it does. The puppy gets up. What do you do?
You understand that it will take patience and repetition. You do not kick the dog. You pick it up, put it back on the spot, and say “sit.” The puppy gets up. Repeat. Eventually the puppy sits and you give it a treat.
I think my dog Touie has ADHD. A hyperactive terrier. You should see how she’ll sit if I say the right words, or even just hold up her leash for a walk.
I was walking with her through my favorite redwood park in the hills near me, which is legally off-leash. I stopped to watch a family with two young kids and two dogs and the husband was training the dogs to sit. What struck me amusing was the wife was training the husband how to train the dogs.
I’m the wife.
4 Main Points
1. We can train our brain to be more grounded, focused, and productive.
2. Our brain naturally wanders and gets hooked into distractions.
3. Understanding brain networks will empower you.
4. Mindfulness practice is the foundation to optimize our brain.
Setting “X”
The classic mindfulness practice is to create an intention to focus on your breath for a set period of time, i.e. 10 minutes. The definition of the word affix is “to fasten, join, or attach. To glue or stick to.” You affix your focus to your breath, trying to stay focused on the sensation of your breath. When you find your mind wandering, simply observe it, describe it to yourself, and redirect your focus back to your breath. Ideally, a simple thought such as “Oh, my mind wandered, go back to your breath.” (Do not pass go, do not collect $200.) Just ZIP right back to your breath. If you find yourself judging yourself, just describe it (“Oh, that’s me judging”) and ZIP right back you your breath. Keep repeating these steps. It can be like playing a game of ping pong in your head, keep bouncing back, or redirecting back, to your breath.
Many people do not realize that this is not about the breathing, it is about the tracking. Instead of the breath, the focal point could be a mantra, a candle, or a body part (as in “Body Scan Meditation”). Here we choose the breath as the focal point, which we can call “X.” In mathematics, “X” is a variable. When we want to focus, X can be anything, or anyone, we choose to focus on. We can learn to affix our focus anywhere we choose.
“X” can also mark the spot of a treasure on a map. Learning to “Mark X” and stay focused opens access to many treasures in life. Optimizing work productivity, deeper connections with others, and greater appreciation of life are just a few.
Networks
The brain consists of functional networks. It’s very illuminating when you understand them. One important network is our “Default Mode Network” (DMN) aka “Default Neural Network” (DNN). It is called “default” because when there is nothing else to focus on, our attention tends to wander over there. Our random thoughts. In Buddhism, the DMN is called the “Monkey Mind.” It is full of chatter, judging, blaming, and frequently distortion. It consists of our “programming” from growing up. We experience it as “the voice in our head.” It is a major cause of distraction, obsessing, and human suffering. We can often get lost in there. When we do, that is the opposite of being “Mindful,” which I call being “Mindless.”
We can call our DMN:
A. Our DMN (or DNN)
B. Monkey Mind
C. The voice in our head
D. Thinking Mind
E. The critic
F. The judge
G. The bully
H. _______ (name), whoever it reminds you of (i.e.. “My mother”)
It is often said that “Neurons that fire together, wire together.” With brain networks, the more we use them the stronger they get. So, with the DMN, the more we listen to it (or engage with it), the more we fuel it and the stronger it gets. Likewise, the less time we spend in there the weaker it becomes.
By contrast, the Executive Network (mainly frontal lobes) is responsible for clear, intentional thinking and focusing. Attention and concentration. Self-awareness. Response inhibition. (Thinking before we act). When we practice focusing on our breath, we are strengthening these “higher” parts of our mind and weakening the DMN. The executive network pays attention to what we are paying attention to. You can call the Executive Network:
A. a monitoring system or,
B. “witnessing” or
C. “The Watcher”
D. “Wise Mind” (DBT) or,
E. “The Meta” or,
F. Being Mindful
It’s like having a little “Executive Secretary” on your shoulder that keeps you from going off-track.
Another network is the limbic system. This is responsible primarily for emotion regulation (as well as social processing, learning, and motivation). Another is the Salience Network. This helps determine what is relevant and important to focus on and what is not. Lastly, for our purposes here, is the “Somatosensory Network” which senses bodily sensations and sends signals to motor cortex to initiate actions. When you focus on the sensation of your breath you are “tuned in” to this network. There are other brain networks as well, which are beyond the scope of this article.
In Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, the Executive Network is synonymous with “Wise Mind” and the Limbic Network is “Emotional Mind.” DBT also defines “Reasonable Mind” as basically whatever we are thinking. Our DMN. They do emphasize that our thoughts are often not “reasonable,” so rather than calling it our “Reasonable Mind,” “Thinking Mind” is a more accurate term.
Wise Mind = Executive Network, Salience Network [OWL]
Thinking Mind = Default Mode Network
Emotion Mind = Limbic Network, Somatosensory Network
All too often, we get hooked on a thought or feeling. When you practice Mindfulness you want your “Wise Mind” to notice when you are getting sidetracked by your Thinking or Emotional Mind and snap back to your focus.
As you will see later, many factors can influence how easy or difficult it will be to maintain this type of awareness. Those factors include how we’ve been keeping up with self-care routines such as sleep, nutrition, exercise, meditation, social and spiritual time.
As you practice Mindfulness, these higher pathways become more and more developed, while the suffering and distractions of the DMN weaken. There are many ways to practice these techniques through the day. Consider also trying “mini-mindfulness moments” through the day.
These are the steps to set focus through the day. Of course, this is much easier said than done. It helps to prepare for your task beforehand, being sure to have adequate sleep, food, exercise, etc. first.
1. Create an intention: “My intention is to focus on “X” for the next ___ minutes. You are marking the spot! Affix your focus there.
2. When you notice your mind wander to something that is “NOT X” simply redirect to X.
3. Repeat.
4. If you find yourself having difficulty staying on X, take a break. You may be dysregulated and need to get regulated first.
5. No judging.
Redirecting:
We can also use this concept to address anxiety, depression, trauma, and other emotional suffering at the core. Anxiety usually is worrying about the future. Depression, stuck in the past. In trauma, the past, present, and future all merge into one. If we create a baseline “X” of the breath, practicing focusing on the breath can break us out of the future tripping, ruminating about the past, or feeling unsafe. Much of that depends, however, on developing that monitoring system, the “Wise Mind” which is asking “Where is my mind, and where do I want it to be?”
We might want to mark “X” as our breath, but the superpower sets in when we realize that “X” can be anything or anyone at any time. When we are mindfully focused on “X” we feel more present, alive, productive, and connected. Examples: X=
· Being with a person we want to connect with
· Staying focused on tasks, from spreadsheets to reading to doing our jobs
· Connecting with nature, spirituality when outdoors (forest, beach)
Just as we can define “X” we can also define “NOT X.” [Next article] By practicing Mindfulness, we become aware of what network we are in. The more time we spend in the DMN “listening to it” in our head, the more we are strengthening it. Arguing with these thoughts also strengthens it. Redirecting from these thoughts, onto another focus (“Changing the channel”) over time weakens the DMN!
Another helpful metaphor here is to consider your DMN as a bully. You can especially see (or “hear”) that when you beat yourself up, blame, call yourself names, or tell yourself what you should or shouldn’t do. If you listen to a bully, you fuel him/her. Likewise, if you argue with them you fuel them. What do we want to do? “Walk away.” This is redirecting. Talk to the hand.
A thought can be like an itch. Ever notice how the more you scratch an itch the worse it gets? Before Psychiatry Residency I did 3 years of General Surgery training. You spend many hours gloved up in operating rooms. If you get an itch too bad. You learn that when you resist the initial urge to scratch it, then it fades away. When we get hooked on a thought, obsessing about it, we are scratching the itch.
Redirecting is easier said than done. The DMN can be quite sticky. The itch is initially hard to resist. The bully tries to follow you. The first step is realizing what network or “channel” we are listening to in our head. (The Wise Mind is responsible for this awareness, aka “waking up”). Then asking, “is this the channel I want to listen to?” “Is this productive?” If it is not, then we work to change the channel.
It doesn’t matter why we think the way we do. Asking ourselves “why” is only more judging, non-acceptance, and contributes to the obsessing. It won’t change anything. However, accepting that our brain just works that way without judging it allows us to begin the longer-term process of rewiring our brain.
We cannot control our thoughts. However, as we step back and identify certain categories of thoughts, such as judging, beating myself up, obsessing, ruminating, future-tripping, or catastrophizing, we can also tag these kinds of thoughts as “UNPRODUCTIVE.” Remember, that will not stop the thoughts! However, we can more and more label them as “NOT X” and develop the routine of REDIRECTING, which is like saying “Change the channel” in our head. Redirecting is not easy, as the thoughts in your head want to persist. There will be a “tug-of-war” between the negative thoughts and what you are trying to redirect to. You are wrestling with a restless mind.
This is where DBT can be very helpful. When we are stuck in a negative channel in our head, we are dysregulated. We want to acknowledge that, and go to the STOP tool.
Consider the STOP tool as a “Pivot” point. When we are dysregulated, and hopefully realizing we are dysregulated, it is very hard to decide what to do to break out of the situation. We’re stuck in the dysregulation. Just decide you want to pivot. Like in basketball, if your shot is about to be blocked, you pivot. You may not know what you are going to do next, you just know you must change direction. Otherwise, you’re just continuing to do something that isn’t working.
S is for STOP what you are doing. Just freeze, don’t say or do anything. Hit the pause button. T is for Take a step back. O is for Observe what is happening. Tell yourself you are safe. Nothing is on fire. P is Proceed mindfully. In this context think about what your options are for getting grounded, regulated. Usually something to distract yourself, soothe yourself, or improve the moment. Maybe a calming audio recording, or going for a walk.
Rather than sit and practice mindfulness for extended periods, it is much more practical and productive to initiate brief periods of mindfulness all through the day. Frequent brief “check-ins” or “mini-mindful moments.”
Little by little we become more present, aware, and focused. Just as you might have a “workflow” when you start work, we want to create a “Mindflow.” A simple check-in that we can run through often. In simple form, in our head, it sounds like this:
“What’s happening right now?”
“What am I thinking? What’s the voice in my head saying?”
“What am I feeling? What am I feeling like doing?”
“What is my priority right now?”
“What will get me there?”
Imagine if we were doing this all day long! It would be like “steering your mind.”
With mindfulness practice, the goal is to focus on one spot, and clear the mind of everything else. The mindfulness check-in is slightly different. While focusing on the present we are also checking in with what is happening around us, what we are thinking, feeling, and what our priorities are.
We all get lost in what’s going on, lost in our head, our task, whatever. We forget to check in. We need real-time cues or reminders to check in. One technique is to set an hourly chime (say, from 9 am to bedtime) on our smartphone, and when we hear the chime it’s a reminder to check in. Another, as Thick Nhat Hanh advises, is each time you get a text message that can be a cue, we can always pause and take a breath before responding to a text. Can you think of other cues we can invent as reminders to check in? Getting ready to start the car. Stopping at a red light. About to walk into a meeting. Arriving home from work.
Doing dishes, vacuuming, walking in the woods. Swimming laps. It facilitates and saves time when you combine mindfulness practice or check-ins with other activities. This habit brings you more and more into the present moment throughout the day. The goal is to be mindful in everything we do!
Exercises: “Training the Puppy” (See video for audio)
1. Marking “X”
When you do a practice exercise, you decide before you start what you want to try and focus on. You are “marking “X”. You are setting an intention to affix your focus. It might be just to focus on the sensation of your breath going in and out. Sometimes it’s a mantra, or a candle. When we do a body scan exercise, “X” will be shifting from one body part to another.
This trains us to set and maintain our attention despite the natural tendency of our mind to wander. Learning to set our intention and then maintain our attention is a superpower which we can use all day long, no matter what we are doing. As you go through your day, ask yourself, “What do I want to be focused on at this time?” When you set your intention, you are “marking X.” Try this whenever you think of it through the day. When you start a task. When you want to talk to someone. Anytime.
2. Focusing on the breath (X= the breath)
This is the classic Mindfulness exercise:
“We are going to set our intention to focus on the sensation of our breath coming into our body and back out. “X” will be the sensation of our breath, mainly in the chest. We are marking the spot.
This exercise requires you to be patient and compassionate with yourself. Your mind will want to wander, you watch, and whenever you notice it wandering, patiently tell yourself “Oh, my mind wandered, just go back to your breath.” This is attention and redirecting.
Find a quiet place and a comfortable position, sitting or lying down. You can keep your eyes open or closed. Start by taking a breath in, through your mouth or nose, and follow it with your mind, down into your lungs, then exhale slowly, following your breath up and out your mouth or nose. Repeat at a comfortable pace. Let go of your to-do lists and other worries that can wait a few minutes. Orient yourself to the fact that nothing is on fire, you are safe.
Training your attention is like training a puppy to sit and stay in one spot. At first it is restless; it doesn’t want to just sit. It wants to get up and move around. Just as with a puppy, you patiently notice it, describe to yourself that it wandered away, “pick it up and put it back on the spot.” It will likely wander away again. Repeat these steps. This is how you train a puppy.
“Where is my mind and where do I want it to be?” Simply nudge it back to your breath. You may find yourself judging. “Am I doing it right?” “Maybe I just can’t do it?” “Why can’t I stay focused?” This is normal. As you notice the judging, describe it to yourself, “This is me judging” and nudge your attention back to your breath. When you find yourself judging, don’t judge your judging. Judging then nudging.
Continue to follow your breath, in, and down, up, and out. Let go of your preconceptions about meditation, such as “my mind should stay where I want it to.” Nope, it doesn’t want to do that. Or, “my mind should be blank.” Nope. Just notice whenever it wants to wander off, accept the wandering without judging, and nudge it back to your breath.
You may want to work on this for several minutes at a time, like following a ping pong (or tennis) game in your head. Follow the ball back and forth. Whenever your attention bounces away, return it back.
You can also practice this throughout the day, whenever you think of it. Frequent, shorter trainings can sometimes be more practical and effective than occasional longer trainings. Whenever you think of it, tell yourself “I’m just going to do an in-breath”, tracking it in and down, and of course back up and out. It can help re-center you, get back into the present, and then get on with what you need to do.
Take as long as you like to play the game in your head. Mind wanders, bring it back. Mind wanders, bring it back. You are training the system that monitors where your brain is and where you want it to be. When you are ready to finish, you can tell yourself you’ve had enough, and slowly bring your attention back to the space around you. If your eyes are closed open them. Take a cleansing breath in and out and return to the world.
3. Body scan (shifting X).
A body scan is like the last exercise, but rather than trying to continuously focus on the breath, we will practice focusing on one area, then shift to another, and another. The goal of “X” is shifting as we do the exercise.
“Let’s start out by getting into a comfortable position, close your eyes gently, take a few slow deep breaths allowing your body to relax. (pause) “X” is the breath.
Bring your awareness to the physical sensations of your breath going in, and down, up and out. (pause). Allow the sensations in your body to take center stage. We will start to focus on sensations in different parts of our body, from the bottom to the top. For each area that we want to focus on, notice when your mind goes somewhere else, gently tell yourself your mind wandered, without judgement, and shift your attention back where we want it to be. No judging, just nudging.
When you are ready, begin by focusing your attention on your feet. You may notice some tingling, warmth, the feel of your socks or shoes, and maybe there won’t be any sensations. That’s ok. “X” is your feet. (pause).
Next let’s move our attention up to the lower legs, the back of the calves, around to the front of your shins. “X” is your calves. Feel the relaxation, or the tension... notice the differences in any areas of tension and allow those areas to simply melt and relax. Move up to your knees, the back of your knees and then the front. The knees are “X”. If you notice any areas of tightness, you can shift your legs so they can be more relaxed. We move our attention next to the upper legs... the thighs, the backs of our thighs, then the front. “X” is our thighs. If our mind wanders elsewhere, or starts to analyze or judge, simply nudge your mind back to your thighs.
Next move upward to your lower back and pelvis area. This area is now “X.” There may be a lot of tension in these areas. Accept whatever sensations you feel, and if you feel discomfort, it’s ok to shift your body. Take some time to stay focused on these areas, and if your mind wanders away, just remind yourself to re-focus on “X.”
Now lets move up our back, and feel the sensations of our lower and upper back. You might notice changes as you breath in and breath out. Your whole back is “X.” Feel your spine, your shoulder blades, and your shoulders. Next lets focus around front to our belly, going up and down with each breath, rising and falling. Move up to your chest area, feeling the sensations of your heart beating, the tension when you breath in and the relaxation when you breath out.
From your chest shift your attention to your arms and hands. Notice any tightness, tingling, or other sensations, or no sensations and enjoy the peacefulness and heaviness in your arms and hands.
Lets move up to the neck, and head. Starting with the sensations in your neck and lower face, notice any tingling, tension, tightness, or discomfort you may be feeling, adjusting your position if it helps. Notice any tension in your jaw, and practice relaxing the area. When your mind wanders, return to your neck and lower face.
Next we focus on the areas around our eyes and forehead. Relax your eyes, relax your forehead, notice the relaxation, how refreshing it is compared with the tension we walk around with.
Now we want to pull our attention back, zoom out, to become aware of our whole body, from our feet to our forehead. Feel your whole body, sitting or lying there in a relaxed state. Breath in deeply through your mouth or nose, allowing the breath and sensations to flow through your entire body. When other thoughts enter your mind, nod towards them, and return your focus to the physical sensations throughout your body. When you are ready, you can open your eyes, stretch, and get back to your normal activity.
4. Standard Mindflow Practice
Throughout the day, we want to remember to set and reset “X” as needed. To do this we must monitor “Where is my mind and where do I want it to be?” Unless we check in regularly, we are likely to wander anywhere but where we want to be. So regular check-ins help us stay on top of our game, become aware when we are off course, and reset.
Here is the format for Standard Mindfulness Check-in, or Mindflow. The more your walk through it the more automatic and natural it becomes.
Take a breath in and follow it down into your lungs. Exhale and follow it up and out. Ask yourself:
What’s happening right now?
What am I thinking right now?
What’s the voice in my head saying?
Am I judging?
What am I feeling? What am I feeling like doing?
What is my priority right now?
What’s gonna get me there?
This check-in will help you stay focused on what or whom you want to be focused on, to stay on track, to help you function optimally.
5. Brief Mindflow
The brief Mindflow I quicker and more to the point. The goal is to recognize when we are dysregulated, upset, not grounded. When we ask “How am I doing?” we are really asking:
“Am I grounded, regulated, and present? If not, is there any reason that I can’t take a few minutes and re-regulate?
The earlier we recognize that we are dysregulated, and re-regulate, the easier it is and the greater effect it will have.