The quiet art of attention

> I like to watch the movement of my attention

I've never really liked the present-tense expression of this idea. If you are watching your attention, is that you directing your attention at your attention? Can you step back again and watch yourself watching yourself watch yourself?

Or is it really a past-tense thing where you notice that your attention has drifted?

Isn't "watching the movement of my attention" another way of saying "being in the present"? To include body scans, etc.

Not GP, but I'll relate my experience. Your attention is always automatically attending to something. You can learn to attend to your attention continually while you're functioning normally in real life. Maintaining this light noticing of what we're noticing, reveals the attitudes of the mind to various objects as we go through our lives. It's a very interesting state to abide in. This is known as the Cittanupassana practice, one of the Vipassana practices described in the Satipatthana Sutta.

Try it and you tell me! ;)

In answer to your question, it’s hard to explain. But no, I don’t find it possible to step back again and observe that meta process. I just tried.

And it is definitely a present-tense action.

It may be that it is merely as you say, directing attention to attention, but it doesn’t diminish the free-flow experiential aspect of the exercise, or the intellectual curiosity.

Just to flesh out the experience, if I’m not paying attention to my experience, attention is still wandering all over the place, I’m just “in it” so to speak, and not noticing. When I observe it happening it has a very different quality to it.

Not to get esoteric, but the best way I could describe it is that there seems to be some observing faculty seperate to the usual sense of self. Which might explain why the exercise can’t devolve into an endless paying attention to paying attention to paying attention…

I would say it is an exercise that can help you to achieve to be in the present more often, but to me, being "in the present" means I am not distracted by anything other than what I am focused on. The moment I also think about what I am focused on, I add a "meta level observer", thus I'm not fully present: I am no longer just in my experience of the presence, I am also in my thoughts, or already in a reaction to my experience.

A body scan can serve this: by checking out everything that I feel and think, I can identify and address irritations that would potentially cause me to not be fully present later. Like a checklist. Safety? Check. Where am I in space and time? Check. Thirst, Hunger? Check. Need to go to the toilet? Check. Comfort? Check. Now, after all that and more, I can better aim to relax into being fully present, ignoring everything that would cause distractions, like thoughts. During the body scan however, I am not fully present.

> Try it and you tell me! ;)

I have tried it and for me I can only notice that my attention has drifted after it has drifted. I've never noticed that my brain is currently trying to turn an auditory signal into a meaningful symbol (symbol is probably not the right word). I only notice that I heard a dog bark.

after meditating regularly for a while, doing a noting practice produced a distinct shift for me on this point. I realized that most of the time, when I hear a sound there is also a momentary "shred" of visual/muscular thought that accompanies it. for example, when I hear a crow, there is a bit of black/feathery/tree-branch/etc. if this is interesting, you can find instructions from Shinzen Young online.

typing this up, I realize I'm not totally sure to what extent this is something that was happening before the practice vs something that developed from it [i.e. less habitual energy spent blocking things out], but either way I recommend it :)