We live in a rapidly changing world. From the ongoing global pandemic to the alarming climate crisis, there are powerful forces playing out every day. 

I believe that contemplative practice has a unique role to play in the healing of our hearts and our world. It can provide the nourishment, inner strength and clarity necessary to engage with the challenges of our times. 

The Buddha once said, “Whatever the mind frequently thinks upon and ponders, that will become its inclination.”

The state of our heart and mind are not fixed. Every day, the way we think, speak, and act etches a little groove into our mind. Thoughts, feelings, intentions and actions harden into habits, and over time settle into our character.

Put another way: we’re always practicing something.

The question is: what are we practicing?

Instead of falling back into patterns of anxiety, agitation, and worry, the daily stress of living can be held with care. The maladaptive habits we’ve accrued over the years can be transformed. Even the emotional wounds we carry from personal or collective trauma can be healed.

We can develop an inner world that is clear, stable, loving, and bright.

The path to transformation is clear, and it begins with how we pay attention.

The capacity to choose where we place our attention is one of the valuable and powerful resources we have. For what we give attention to grows in the mind, and shapes our inner atmosphere.

We can pay attention not just to what we are doing, but also to how we are living. We can slowly training our hearts to cultivate a healthier, more resilient and nourishing way of life. 

It takes wisdom to use our attention to skillfully, to know what's worth paying attention to and what isn't. Wisdom itself develops through applying attention, by tracking our experience carefully and learning what is for our true welfare and what isn't.

So I invite you to take a closer look.

Where does your attention go when you are not consciously directly it? What do you think about when you’re waiting for the bus, standing in the grocery line, or lying down to fall asleep at night? What kinds of emotions or moods do you gravitate towards when nothing else is happening? 

When you notice your heart and mind stuck in some unhelpful loop, ruminating, complaining or grumbling, can you take a step back inside? Consider: what would be most helpful right now? Where can I put my attention that will be uplifting or grounding? Soothing or steadying? Healing or comforting?

This isn't about avoiding or denying the hardships in life, but about exercising more choice over how we use our mind, and what we cultivate in the heart.

When in doubt, here are three places to place your attention that can help nourish your spirit, and cultivate the best in you:

1. Notice beauty: Look and listen for the natural beauty that is present in everyone and the world around us. Linger there and let it in.
2. Practice gratitude: Turn your attention to anything you appreciate or feel grateful for. Give yourself time to let this register.
3. Offer kindness: Aim your heart towards kindness. Silently wishing well to yourself and those around you, reaching for the sincerity of the wish.

Warmly,

Oren