I’ve tried different forms of meditation a few times in my life but none have worked for me. Until now! Let’s start by delaying that gratification and first talk about the ways that didn’t work.

Some Forms of Meditation I’ve Tried

First I tried the hardcore way of meditating by trying to empty my head of all thoughts and hold that nothingness for as long as possible. Needless to say, it was a complete failure. I found it impossible to quieten my inner voice for more than a pause. Some people claim that they can do such meditation but I’m skeptical of such claims because of how hard it is for me personally.

Then I tried meditating by focusing on my breath. It was a good way to develop attention as well as awareness of one’s body. I began by noticing the different sensations my body was feeling from head to toe and then I’d center on the sensation of breathing and try to focus on that for as long as possible. At these times I wasn’t thoughtless. I was thinking in my mind, “breath in… breath out…” on repeat. I figured this was still better than letting my thoughts run wild.

But after a few minutes I’d jump on some train of thought and start daydreaming and only realize I wasn’t paying attention to breathing, after a long time. I stopped doing this style of meditation because it seemed to feed my obsessive maladaptive daydreaming.

I also tried a form of meditation where I’d close my eyes and focus on the sounds I was hearing. I’d try to isolate each sound and pay attention to where it was coming from. In terms of controlling my train of thoughts, this was the most effective form of meditation that I tried. While I was paying attention to sounds and trying to discover what other sounds I could hear, my mind would remain pretty thoughtless other than naming the sound I was hearing. But once I had explored all the sounds that I could hear, it became difficult to focus on just one sound for a long time and the train of thoughts restarted.

My New Take on Meditation

I recently got back to the idea of meditation but not from a spiritual angle. I want to train my attention. Like a muscle. I want to do reps of focused attention every day. And since my last attempts at meditation, I’ve learned that scientists have discovered that mental attention is very closely tied to visual focus.

So, I came up with an impromptu exercise. I took my wristwatch and focused on the second hand. I looked at it as if it was my prey and I was a predator; as if my survival depended on not letting the second hand get out of my sight.

Immediately, it worked better than any form of meditation that I had tried. I was still having thoughts but they were all related to the second hand or the watch itself. As long as I kept my eyes focused on the second hand, it was impossible for me to think anything else.

Eventually, I got bored of looking at the watch intently and my thoughts began drifting. When this happened, I noticed that my eyes would defocus and I would lose track of the second hand. And in the peripheral vision of my mind’s eye, I’d notice that the second hand isn’t where I thought it was. This realization broke my wandering thought immediately and I could bring my attention back to the watch and the second hand.

I’ve never been able to have this strong a control over my drifting thoughts. Right now, I do a 5 minute drill, once a day. It’s never been as easy as right now to meditate for this long without drifting off into daydreams. I feel like I can easily increase it to 10 minutes but I’d rather increase the number of times I do the drill first and then consider increasing the time.

But what’s most interesting is, why is this drill working better than anything else I’ve tried?

The Puppy on the Leash

I was trying to figure this out and I came up with a very good analogy. Our mind is like a puppy. Trying to do meditation is like trying to control the puppy.

When I was doing the hardcore version of meditation, it was like trying to control the puppy with telepathic commands. It was never going to work. Meditating by focusing on breath or sound is like controlling the puppy via subtle commands and treats. It can work when the puppy is low energy but it won’t work for long and not at all when the puppy is excited.

But using eyes to focus on something is like putting a leash on the puppy. Science is proving that visual focus is like a leash for the mind. We’ve evolved in such a way that it’s easiest for us to pay attention to the thing that we’re watching with out eyes. That’s why moving pictures on screens capture our attention so completely.

When the puppy is on a leash, it can still try to run around but it can’t go far. You don’t have to do anything other than just hold on to the leash. Eventually, the puppy will get tired or bored and sit down next to you.

To be fair, there are meditation techniques that use visual focus. Some focus on a candle flame, others on a holy image. For some reason, I never tried them on my journey from spirituality to philosophy. But now I have a rationally derived technique which if I want, I don’t even have to call meditation. It can just be my attention workout.

If you’ve never tried it, give some form of visual focus based meditation a try. I’m pretty sure you’ll be pleasantly surprised with the results.

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Cover Photo by Hugo Kruip on Unsplash