Attention and awareness

Discovering attention and awareness

You have started meditating on the breath and it is going pretty well, but even when you have your full attention on the breath, you still notice that you can hear sounds and feel the body. Other senses are still there, but they seem to have a different quality to them. The sensations of the breath are detailed and in focus, while the rest has a vaguer sort of presence.

Great! You have discovered that we can perceive the senses in two different ways—through attention and awareness. Culadasa was the first teacher to introduce this distinction from modern psychology into the practice of meditation—a distinction surprisingly valuable in exploring consciousness.

Definition and function

Let's get formal by using a definition of Brown (2003):

• Attention is a process of focusing conscious awareness, providing heightened sensitivity to a limited range of experience.

• Awareness is the background "radar" of consciousness, continually monitoring the inner and outer environment. One may be aware of stimuli without them being at the center of attention.

You need awareness to direct your attention. Otherwise, you could be reading this text while someone is screaming at you, without you ever noticing it. The screams weren't in your attention—this text is—so how could you ever notice without awareness of sounds?

An example in daily life

Suppose you just bought a cup of steaming hot soup that is filled to the brim and you're walking towards a table with your friends. Your attention is with the cup of hot soup, because otherwise you will spill it all over the place, but there is also awareness of your surroundings. If there isn't awareness, then you might bump into something. Your attention isn't stuck at the soup, but it jumps around. When you get close to someone or something, your attention jumps to get a more detailed look, after which it jumps back to the soup.

If you're mindful to your everyday experiences, then you will find your attention jumping around all the time—sometimes multiple times within a single second.

References

• The Mind Illuminated by Culadasa

• Brown, K. W., & Ryan, R. M. (2003). The benefits of being present: mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Journal of personality and social psychology, 84(4), 822.