Attentional Awareness | How to build a ‘Fortress of Attention’
Have you ever found yourself checking email or social media only to see something that triggers feelings of panic, anxiety, frustration, or disconnect?
What about being overwhelmed by those feelings as you prepare for a big meeting, game, or conversation?
Or perhaps you become consumed with sadness, doubt, shame, or disappointment as you dwell over a past experience...
Where your attention goes, your system follows.
At our best, our attention connects us to the present moment, allowing us to shift effortlessly into a state of flow and peak performance. It also is the key ingredient to building new neural pathways and creating more potent states of peak performance and optimal recovery.
At our worst, the hijacking of our attention can sabotage and undermine our best intentions, taking our whole system down in a spiral of negativity and depleting emotions and feelings.
“Attentional Awareness” - Owning Your Units of Attention
Our attention is one of the most important resources we have - and wielding it, having ownership over our "units of attention" and where we deploy them, is one of the most important skills we can train in our optimal performance, recovery, and growth toolkit.
It's part of why we practice meditation with each experience here at The Wellness Den. Meditation is one of the most potent tools for building a fortress of attention in our minds.
How to Build Your Fortress of Attention
These tools are called "neural exercises."
They are mini-interventions to help us pause the downward spiral or suboptimal behavior, take a moment to reset, and then choose with intention how to respond. It turns out to build our fortress of attention, we need many of these tools and dozens of mini-interventions every single day.
What do these neural exercises and mini-interventions do?
They help us widen the gap between stimulus and response, and this is where we have the opportunity to create new neural pathways and more optimal responses.
We can shift our emotional state, regain flow and peak performance, and build an adaptable relationship with our nervous system.
It's also one of the three foundational pillars we explore and build a toolkit for in our Pause to Grow Day Retreat and my 1:1 Mentorship Programs.
Reflection Questions
How often are you pausing to become aware of your attention?
What percentage of your day do you spend fully immersed in the present moment? Not rehashing the past or time-travelling to the future.
How often do you notice your attention pulling you down into suboptimal emotional or nervous system states?
Do you have a set of tools or 'neural exercises' that allow you to interrupt the pattern, find a moment of pause, and shift into a more optimal response?
How often do you practice meditation or other attention-strengthening techniques to build your fortress of attention?
What communities and groups do you get to share strategies and learnings with, bringing more of your attention into the present moment?
If this topic resonates with you, I'd love to see you at one of our upcoming Pause to Grow Retreats, where we'll spend a whole day diving in and practicing tools related to this topic!
And of course, I'd love to hear your thoughts and feedback!
Sincerely,
Tyrell
