Change Your Focus … Change Yourself

May 25th, 2008 | Uncategorized | No Comments »

“Energy flows where attention goes.” When I teach yoga I say this all the time to my students. This profoundly simple phenomenon applies to what happens outside of class as well. Not only does energy flow where attention goes, you also “become what you focus your attention on.”

If you want to change yourself, watch what you focus (meditate) on. Oh … so you don’t think you’re a meditator? Or if you do meditate, it’s not often enough to count? Well, I’ve got some news for you. You are a meditator and you are creating yourself from that practice, whether you’re conscious of it or not.

Webster’s dictionary defines meditation as “to focus one’s thoughts on,” which suggests that this applies to even when your eyes are open! You are meditating all the time and probably don’t know it. Whatever you are primarily focusing your thoughts on becomes the object of your meditation. I invite you to take this one step further and consider that after a while you become like the object of your meditation. Simply put, you become what you meditate or focus on. For example, pet owners start to look like their dogs, TV watchers start thinking and speaking in terms of commercials and sitcoms, farmers take on the qualities of the land they tend, and new mothers have the softness of the babies they nurture, etc.

So, changing your life is as simple as shifting what you’re focusing on. Really. Advertisers know that their most valuable asset is the public’s attention. They want you to think about (meditate) on their product. For the most part, everyone is unconsciously meditating, allowing outside influences like the media to dictate their focus. It’s an entirely different matter to consciously meditate.

This means to intentionally choose the things you focus your thoughts and attention on.

Your focus has great power, probably more than you’ve ever known.

The question isn’t, “Do you meditate?” — of course you do.

The questions are:

• “What are you focusing on now that you were unaware of?”
• “Who do you want to be?”

Because it really is true…

You become what you focus (meditate) on.