Part Two:
The role of dharana/meditation for people with busy minds
In Part One, we talked about what to do when your senses pull you away from meditation. Now let’s look at what happens when the distraction comes from inside—your own thoughts.
When you meditate, you choose a focal point for the mind. Let’s say you’ve chosen breath awareness. You’ve settled into a comfortable space, your body is relaxed, and you’re following the smooth rise of the inhale and the easeful release of the exhale. Body’s breathing in. Body’s breathing out. You’re right there with the breath… and then suddenly a memory pops up. Before you know it, your awareness has wandered off with the thought and left your breath behind. Sound familiar?
It’s understandable you’d feel discouraged when you sit down seeking quiet, only to discover that the moment your body gets still, your mind gets loud.
Encountering the contents of the mind can be unexpected and incongruent with the expectation of tranquility you associated with meditation. This is why it helps to understand the process of meditation.
It is normal for the mind to move. The beauty of practicing meditation is that we can begin to watch that movement with less attachment and collect the mind by inviting it to move in a particular way. This increases our concentration and mental agility. Rather than creating a story about the thought, analyzing it, assigning meaning to it, we simply notice: “Awareness is with the breath. Awareness is not with the breath.” When the mind has moved from your chosen focal point, you acknowledge and patiently, persistently, lovingly bring it back.
With practice, curiosity about the focal point becomes more compelling than transient thoughts. Curiosity about the clarity and tranquility of the vast still lake of the mind becomes more intriguing than the ripples of thought on its surface. Individual drops of concentrated focus become a smoothly flowing stream of awareness. Flowing awareness expands into formless presence where you experience the quietude that drew you to practice in the first place.
Because the rewards of meditation accumulate gradually, it helps to adopt a long-term perspective. Think of it like physical training. You don’t expect dramatic transformation after one workout. You show up consistently, trusting the process. With repetition, the space between thoughts increases. Your reactivity to the thoughts decreases. You grow in relationship to the part of you that watches the mind move and remains steady, aware, unafflicted.
Some days will feel calm. Others will feel chaotic. The mind may be predominantly dull, or active or tranquil. Whatever qualities are present, the practice is the same: sit, notice, acknowledge, return.
There are many ways to prepare for meditation, many techniques to explore, and many approaches that can support your practice. Like movement, meditation is not one‑size‑fits‑all. A teacher can help tailor the process to you.
Meghan Hogan, E-RYT 500, CCC-SLP is Lead Faculty for the Yoga Vidya Teacher Training and In-Depth Studies program, a Speech-Language Pathologist supporting preschool children with disabilities and their families, a wife and mother.
Meghan’s mission in sharing yoga is to guide people home to their own hearts, trusting that cultivating this inner relationship fosters uplifted connections in homes and communities.