Attention: focused presence

While I think of mindfulness as openness and awareness to ourselves, to others, to the world around us, to the Divine, attention is a focusing practice, more directed than broad. Being present and focusing in the moment is powerful, both as giver and as receiver. We all love good attention.

Using the reflective practice of spiritual reading, let's start our exploration of attention with this reading by James Hillman, taken from Spiritual Literacy, ed. by Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat.

"Not only persons call for service; their things do, too--the oil changed, the VCR cleaned, the dryer repaired, the message transmitted. Ceremonies of the repairman. Objects have their own personalities that ask for attention, just as the ads show the smiling bathtub that enjoys the new cleanser or the wood siding that likes the fresh stain which prevents it from decay. Treating things as if they had souls, carefully, with good manners--that's quality service ...
This idea of service demands surrender, a continuous attention to the Other. It feels like humiliation and servitude only when we identify with a ruling willful ego as mirror of a single dominating god. But what is a God is in each thing, the other world distributed within this world?
Theology calls this distribution of the divine within all things the theory of immanence, and sometimes, pantheism....
A theology of immanence means treating each thing, animate and inanimate (perhaps the distinction no longer clearly obtains), natural and man-made, as if it were alive, requiring what each living thing requires above all else: careful attention to its properties, their specific qualities. This plant needs little water; this wood won't bear great weight and burns with a smoky fire. Look at me carefully: I am an aspen, not an oak. Notice differences, pay attention, give respect (re-spect = look again). Notice what is right under your nose, at your fingertips, and attend to it as it asks, according to its needs."

If you need a reminder about the steps of spiritual reading, take a moment.

As you read and re-read this passage, what do you notice? What words or phrases draw you in? What catches your eye or ear? What speaks to your own sense of service, of attention, of care?

Then as you come out of the quiet of your meditation, and go about your day, attention is the practice of focusing on what it is you are doing. If you're getting up to make a meal, just make a meal. If you are having a conversation with your child or partner or friend, just be present for that conversation, not five other things. Thomas Keating reminds us, "This is where attentiveness to the content of the present moment is a way of putting order into the myriad occupations, thoughts, and events of daily life. Attention to this context simply means to do what we are doing. This was one of the principal recommendations of the Desert Fathers and Mothers of the fourth century. The disciple would come for instruction and say, “I am interested in finding the true self and becoming a contemplative. What should I do?” The desert guides would reply in the most prosaic language, “Do what you’re doing,” which means, bring your attention to the present moment and its immediate context and keep it there. For instance, it is time for supper. Well, put the food on the table. This is true virtue. Turning on the television at that time or making a needless phone call might not be. Attending to the present moment means that our mind is on what we are doing as we go through the day. We are thus united to God in the present moment instead of wondering about what we are going to do next or tomorrow."

Full attention to another person is perhaps one of the best gifts you can give someone. Being fully present with one another in love is the best practice for relationship health that I have found. As Keating says, "we are thus united to God in the present moment," manifesting the divine in that moment of presence.