Intention + Attention

Saturday morning, after I rocked out a 7am Body Combat class at the YMCA, in which I get to channel my inner Buffy The Vampire Slayer, I attended my second long sit with my meditation teacher. It was from 9am to 1pm and included three 30-minute meditation session and one 45-minute sit that was broken up between 30 minutes of mindfulness meditation and 15 minutes of kindness meditation.  My husband, David, joked with me that I was going from Body Combat to Mind Combat, which was a pretty good comparison. 

It's amazing how active our egos are. Thinking thinking. Always solving something. Forward thought. Backward thoughts. There were five students in the class from ages 40 to latter 70s, and our teacher began the first 30-minute sit by telling us, "Don't believe anything you think."  

She is very clear to explain we need no journals or books, we should avoid eye contact, and there is no talking. We take 15 minute moving body breaks between still mindfulness meditation sitting sessions, where we slowly walk around the lovely building which has two solariums on the book ending tower top floors.  The intentional stillness of this day is kind of mind blowing. (note: The word "solarium" is so romantic to me. I picture the 1995 redo of the original Audrey Hepburn movie Sabrina where Harrison Ford plays Linus Larrabee who falls in love with the chauffeur's daughter, Sabrina, played by Julia Ormond. There is a scene in the solarium, sigh.) 

Our teacher guides us through the beginning of each meditation, where we were each comfortably sitting in chairs or on yoga pillows, stacked to properly support the body. At the beginning of the second sit, she used the phrase, "Be mindful to sit with intention and attention." 

These two words, intention and attention, seeped into my practice that day. As I focused on my breath to clear my mind.  In and out.  The word "intention" came with my inhalation. And "attention" accompanied my exhalation.  

I've been carrying them with me and will continue using them as I try to sit daily for at least 10 minutes. The busy lives we lead are full of so much mind chatter and physical motion that trying to have more clearly defined intention and attention is something that can surely help me notice new moments around me.  I'm so thankful to have the chance to continue learning about meditation and see how the power of it can positively impact my life and those around me. 

So may you, too, carry these words - Intention and Attention - into your week. Whether if it's deciding what foods would most benefit your body at a certain time or how you respond to a child's tantrum or client's feedback on a work project, may you have pause in your day to breath in positive intention and exhale kindness and focused attention. 

Lotsa Love,

Leah