ADHD is a kind of “loss of control over your attention”.
Meditation is “getting control over your attention”.
So you see the connection there.
Yes. Personally I can’t stand guided meditation - it never moves at the right speed. Za-zen, Vipassana, Hwa Tou, mantras, fire gazing, Silent Illumination, and others can be helpful.
The key is to remember that meditation is practice - there’s no end state where you’ve “gotten it right.”
Getting distracted is not failure. Noticing that you’ve become distracted and bringing attention back to your focus is success.
I like to think of it as exploring. Or experimenting.
For a beginner at the “focusing” type meditation, to hold your attention upon your “focus object” for 10 seconds straight is amazing. It’s surprisingly difficult.
- Meditation is a good idea for anybody and takes many forms.
- Your post comes off with a “why don’t you just…” vibe to me. I don’t like the tone honestly. You don’t think a community of people with ADHD have heard of meditation? Do you go into depression related communities and ask if they’ve just tried being happier?
I get the idea of trying to help but it isn’t very productive IMHO.
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maybe, maybe not. There are differences that aren’t so different and there’s a lot of smoke around the subject. We’d be better off to talk more specifically, maybe. I’m being specific about the “controlling your attention” thing, for example.
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Hmm. Getting offended is basically the national sport of the internet. So you’ll pardon me if I take it with a grain of salt. I’m striving for brevity and clarity here. I for one find tiptoeing around the point to avoid offending anybody to be the most offputting style. But all that noise aside, ya, speaking as an AS guy who meditates, it’s a really big deal. I’m actually intentionally avoiding getting too handwavey and excited about it here because people tend to find that REALLY offputting.
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I tried, I never managed to do it. With guided meditation, I get angry at the person speaking. ”Holy shit shut up” kind of deal. With anything I have to do by myself, I get extremely self conscious and uncomfortable.
I hate guided meditation too. So much bullshit. And those fucking meditation apps too.
Meditation is a nice fire surrounded by a gigantic cloud of smoke. You gotta experiment and explore and figure it out for yourself to get through the smoke and find the fire.
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I meditate to techno and often while busy with a dumb hand task. Meditation isn’t the same for everyone and the occasional Ohm or dead silence might not be enough for you.
I think that I am referring to something different from what you are referring to.
What I am referring to is like physical exercise, except with attention.
The term “meditation” has become unspecific and fuzzy in its general usage.
I am using it in the way that the Buddhists and Raja Yogis use it.
I don’t think we’re talking about different things. I achieve a peaceful state of serenity when emerged in a chaos that distracts the majority of my chaotic energy - then I can focus and indulge in a peaceful calm.
We’re going to the same place but taking different roads - neither is better, but some roads are easier for different people to walk.
There is no single right way to meditate.
No really, we’re talking about something different.
In this meditation that I’m referring to, there is peace, but that is only one facet. There is also control and understanding of attention. That’s central.
It’s not really meditating, but I think the effect is somewhat similar. I love cycling, it allows me to clear up my mind of anything else. It’s like I forget anything that happened before, or will happen after and my mind is only on what my body and bike are doing, and what’s on the trail. Sorta hyperfocus but without the strain on your mind
Tried to, but it instead it makes me super aware of every bodypart, and suddenly everything is uncomfortable. That was the usual sit cross legged, recite a mantra kind of meditation.
Now I just do breathing exercises instead, count 1 to 10, then back down, focusing on my breathing. I usually have to do that when I’m very tired but still can’t manage to fall asleep due to my wandering mind. It helps settle myself down. I still manage to get distracted though, counting in different languages and catching myself doing it, then wondering if trying to correct it is better than just letting it be.
I tried mantra too. And a few other “things to focus on”. I experimented.
I ended up using breath too. Specifically, I used the feeling of breath in the tip of my nose.
FYI. That focusing type meditation is what the Buddhists call “Samatha”. It’s also called Anapanasati, Concentration Meditation, Samprajnata Dhyana, and a few other names, depending on who’s talking.
There’s another kind of meditation too. The Buddhists call it “Vipassana”. It’s pretty great. It’s another thing to do with your attention. Something other than focusing and concentrating.
Huh, interesting. I’ll look into it. Might help nail down how I do it cus it helps, but not much.
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Adhd is not ‘loss of control over attention’. It’s an executive function disorder.
Meditation isn’t ‘getting control over attention’ it’s paying attention to your inner self in order to create a distance between you and your thoughts. It’s more about the realisation that you aren’t your thoughts, feelings, emotions, but that the real you is having them.
You don’t need to be meditating to control your attention.
I used to do samatha. Then samatha and vipassana. Now just vipassana.
What meditation technique do you like?
Does progressive muscle relaxation count as meditation?
If so: yes, but not as a constant part of my daily routine, more like something i start using again during stressful times or if i find myself rummaging through negative thoughts a lot.
By meditation I mean what the Buddhists and Raja Yogis mean.
It is the manipulation and cultivation of attention. To gain control over it.
We don’t choose our thoughts. They arrive unbidden, sometimes colored by feelings, but they always pass and get replaced by, again, more thoughts and feelings. They are temporary, but the consciousness that experiences the stream of thoughts is not. We are that consciousness and meditation is largely just allowing our attention to rest in our fundamental being, that of awareness. There is no objective goal meant to be found in mediation as I know it. It is the absence of intent and seeking in favor of just being. The idea that mediation requires us to quiet the mind is anti-meditation to me. The mind becomes quieter the more I’ve stopped trying to shut it up. Trying to make my mind’s chatter go away only provides it with the attention that fuels it. There is no sound without silence. There is no activity without stillness. It is possible to feel within awareness that you are that stillness and silence, that it is not other or objective, but a core part of your being perhaps worth exploring
That’s lovely.
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A bit of experimentation might be required. Different kinds of “object to focus on” work differently for different people.
I do, from time to time. But I need to pair it with exercise for it to be effective. Without exercise, my mind wanders too easily. Pairing it with exercise allows me to raise my dopamine enough to make the thoughts concrete and easier to be aware of.
All the time. It’s second nature and I can do it anywhere. Once freaked someone out when I was driving a car and I told them to be quiet because I was meditating. They thought I was going to go into a trance and crash the car. I was just clearing my mind so I wouldn’t crash the car.
Shamans of yore referred to AS maladies as “the teaching disease”. Because it teaches you something important about reality. Something that’s otherwise hard to see.
