Exercise your attention

Exercising your attention equips you to feel more alive and respond more effectively.

It’s easy to miss the experience of being alive. We tend to spend a lot of time thinking about the past and predicting the future. We unconsciously resist discomfort and choke the life out of pleasure.

Practicing mindfulness is a counter-instinctual way to disrupt these tendencies to savor pleasant moments more, wrestle less internally with the unpleasant ones, and feel more alive.

Demystify mindfulness

Ironically, the promotion of mindfulness often gets in the way of practicing it.

People who try mindfulness exercises often convince themselves they’re doing them wrong even when they’re doing them right. They rule themselves out of consistent practice in ways they wouldn’t when it comes to strength training, walking, running, or stretching.

Thriving requires being forgoing comfort — temporarily, consistently, and in ways that develop liberating capacities.

Comparing attentional fitness to physical fitness clarifies expectations to help you:

• Interpret the experience of attention exercises more accurately

• Use goals to design personalized exercise programs

• Discover the variety of exercise options available

• Learn to embrace the discomforts of challenging skill development

• Emphasize consistent practice over immediate results