Meditation

8 Tips for Thinking & Learning #3

This advice comes from the excellent book, Pragmatic Thinking & Learning by Andy Hunt.

You know that voice you hear in your head? The one that talks to you? Can you turn it off? Can you make it stop?

Andy Hunt asks you to try the following ...

Sit down and take a moment. Don't think about the mistakes you made yesterday or worry about problems that might come up tomorrow. Focus on now. This one instant in time. Right here. No distractions. No chatter.

Can you do it? Can you turn off the Linear Mode (left side) of your brain? The constant chatter in our head distracts us. It distracts us from paying attention in meetings. It distracts us from fully absorbing the material we're reading. It distracts us from the ideas developing in the Rich Mode of our brain. How do we learn to turn it off so that we can pay better attention?

One way is through the use of meditation. By meditating early in the morning, or before bedtime every evening, you will train your brain to maintain focus. You will learn to turn off the Linear Mode chatter and you will find yourself focusing on the material at hand better.

Find a quiet place in your house. Sit upright ... alert. Do not lay down. Do not fall asleep. Close your eyes. Your brain will talk to you ... you will ignore it. You will not "have a conversation with yourself". Focus only on your breath. Let your thoughts fall to the wayside. Do not give voice to them. Do not judge them. Just focus on your breath.

Sound easy? It's not. My advice is find a good book on meditation and start practicing. I hope to master it at some point and I hope you will as well.