Gymnastics Of Attention

I once tried an improv class to see if that would finally help calm my stage nerves. It didn't. But I did learn something amazing.

If an actor is trying to show the audience that they love someone, they can do this by spending a lot of time looking at that someone. Returning their gaze to their object of love, again and again, glancing, tracking, noticing details. To us sitting in the audience, this looks a lot like love. We see where the actor's attention is going, and we intuitively sense their care. Even a child would sense it. The simplicity of this really hit home. What we look at is what we care about!

A great metaphor for noticing is "gymnastics of the attention." It comes from Simone Weil, who taught philosophy of science at the Lycée for Girls in Le Puy. She used the phrase to talk about teaching as the training of attention. And metaphors matter. This one emphasises the role of movement, practice and choice in what we attend to. Sure, we could fall (and stay up late doomscrolling), but we can also get back up and have another go. Over time, what we practice looking at is what we care about.

I began my career working on social challenges such as homelessness and climate change. Fifteen years in, I shifted my focus to the inner dimension of mindfulness, and many of my friends and colleagues were a little worried. They thought I'd been on one too many yoga retreats and given up on the hard stuff! But to me, it was the opposite. It's when we stop noticing each other, and how connected we all are that we're more likely to feel lonely, alienated, polarised and even exploitative.

So the question is: What is worth noticing? We have seemingly endless choices in our infinite scrolls and instant searches. But on closer examination, we find algorithms creating monocultures masquerading as choice. It might look like a feast, but it's mostly just corn syrup. Attentionally malnourished, we can easily start feeling disconnected from ourselves, each other and the natural world.

In my head, there is a thread of logic around slowness -> curiosity -> choice -> noticing -> connecting -> caring, but often, the words all fold into a gloopy mess of earnestness.

From time to time, when you're paying attention to something, pause to ask yourself, "Was this a choice I made?" Get curious about how much of what you see is directed by habit or external influences versus your own personal practice, your own gymnastics of attention.