Where is your mind right now? Probably partly here, and partly somewhere else. Our mind continues to drag us towards earlier conversations, something we still need to do, or worries about next week. It’s entirely normal. But it is also a drain on our happiness.

The default: a wandering mind
In a large study, researchers used an app to ask over two thousand people at random moments of the day what they were doing, what they were thinking about, and how happy they felt. Their minds were wandering almost half of the time. During nearly every activity, people reported thinking about something else in at least 30 percent of the moments sampled.

People were generally less happy when their minds were elsewhere. This was particularly clear when their thoughts were neutral or unpleasant; pleasant thoughts did not make them happier than focusing on their activity. What stood out was that where their attention was explained more of the differences in happiness than what they were actually doing. We can spend so much effort arranging a life we hope to enjoy, while barely paying attention to it as it happens.

In my piece on fear, I wrote that fear pulls us into a future that has not happened yet. This research shows how often our attention leaves the present even when we are not afraid. We do not need to be facing something difficult to miss the life we are actually living. Being elsewhere in our minds is one of our most common defaults, to which, as always, intention is the solution.

The brain's default mode
There is a brain network involved in this. Scientists call it the default mode network: a set of brain regions involved in internally focused thinking, such as remembering the past, imagining the future, and considering other people’s perspectives. It also supports deliberate activities such as planning.

The name is a fitting coincidence, but this network is not something we need to overcome. It helps us remember, plan, and imagine. The default we want to interrupt is letting our thoughts occupy our attention without choosing it. Here again, replacing default with intention means noticing where our attention has gone and choosing whether to keep it there.

Meditation: choosing where attention goes
Meditation is the practice of turning your attention away from distracting thoughts toward a single point. It brings your attention back to the present moment: the breath you are taking, what you feel in your body, or the compassion you are consciously practicing.

In one brain-imaging study, researchers compared experienced meditators with people who did not regularly meditate. They examined three forms of meditation and found lower activity in parts of the default mode network in the experienced meditators during all three. They also found differences in how this network connected with regions involved in monitoring and directing attention, even while the experienced meditators were resting. This suggests that the ability to notice and manage wandering thoughts may extend beyond meditation itself.

In another study, people who practiced loving-kindness meditation for several weeks reported increasing positive emotions in their daily lives. As I described earlier, I have experienced its effectiveness myself. It can eliminate negative emotions rather instantly, regardless of how you might feel about a person.

The practice of meditation itself is simpler than it sounds. Your mind will wander every time, but noticing that it has wandered and bringing it back, without judging yourself, is the meditation.

The I Ching describes Keeping Still through the image of mountains. This includes knowing when to rest and when to move, while keeping our thoughts with the situation at hand.

That speaks to what I want from the practice of attention. The good thing is, there is a new opportunity to return to what is happening now in every moment, whether that means sitting still, listening to someone, or responding to something that needs action. Presence supports a fuller, and happier, experience of life.

Becoming absorbed in life
You probably know the feeling. You are so absorbed in what you are doing that you forget the time, forget yourself, and only notice hours later that you are hungry. Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi called this flow: a state of deep involvement in which your attention is absorbed in the activity itself.

Flow tends to arise when a challenge stretches your skills without overwhelming them. You have a clear sense of what you are trying to do, and enough feedback to recognize how it is going. You can respond to what is happening and adjust as you go.

When the challenge feels too small, your attention could drift. When it feels far beyond your abilities, you may become anxious or overwhelmed. Somewhere in between those types of experiences, there can be something that asks enough of you to hold your attention while still feeling possible and exciting to work with.

Your interest in the activity can help draw you in, and that interest may develop as you learn. Having some freedom in how you approach it and time without repeated interruptions can help you become absorbed.

These are conditions that can support flow. The experience itself involves deep concentration, less awareness of yourself, and often a changed sense of time. It’s a beautiful thing when you become occupied with doing, rather than watching and judging yourself doing it.

Flow brings us into the present through deep involvement in what we are doing. And as we have already explored, this moment is where happiness lives. Our attention is absorbed in the activity, while unrelated worries, memories, and anticipation recede. There may still be an outcome we are working toward, but our attention is on the doing itself.

Attention throughout the Well
Attention is involved in both what nourishes us and what we offer. It helps us recognize what we need, appreciate what we receive, and notice when something needs to change. It also allows us to listen to another person, understand what they are expressing, and respond with care. Its place in the Well extends from the foundation into how we live and relate to others.

Our life is only happening now. Even when we enjoy a memory or look forward to something, the happiness we feel is experienced in this moment. That’s where happiness can be found.

Brewer et al. (2011)
Fredrickson et al. (2008)
Killingsworth & Gilbert (2010)
Raichle et al. (2001)
Spreng & Grady (2010)
Spreng et al. (2010)
Wilhelm (1950)
Csikszentmihalyi (1990)