I'm going to show you how to reduce mind-wandering by increasing your meta-awareness.
Why it matters: The majority of distractions come not from our external environment, but from our own thoughts. Developing the ability to become aware of what you’re aware of is essential for noticing when your mind wanders and bringing your focus back quickly.
This skill enhances your ability to perform deep work, reduces the time lost to distraction, and ultimately increases your productivity and effectiveness.
It also makes life generally less frustrating and more enjoyable.
Advice about improving concentration typically centres on eliminating external distractions.
Turn off notifications, turn on binaural beats, lock yourself in a room, problem solved.
But it's internal distractions — our own thoughts, feelings, and sensations — that cause us the most difficulties.
People struggle to get work done because they get lost in thoughts unrelated to what they're working on — and many seconds or minutes may pass before they realise it. They then scold themselves for losing focus, which leads to more distracting thoughts.
A lot of options exist to combat external interruptions, from distraction blockers to headphones to dumbphones.
But tools to avoid getting hooked by your own internal processes? This is a different kind of challenge that requires a different kind of solution.
Because mind wandering is completely normal and healthy.
You do it for nearly half of every day. And a lot of great insights come to you when in this state. (Think ‘shower thought’.) But to work deeply on one important thing for a long period of time, you need to wrangle in these meanderings.
In fact, the people who are really good at concentrating are actually just really good at noticing when their mind has wandered — and they can bring their focus back to the task at hand faster than you and I can.
They’re acutely aware of where their attention is directed at any moment. We call this meta-awareness.
There are practical steps you can take to develop meta-awareness and improve your concentration.
By becoming meta-aware, you'll experience:
- Improved ability to notice and correct distractions.
- Enhanced capacity for deep work and sustained focus.
- Increased self-compassion and reduced stress related to distractions.
- Greater intentionality in how you use your attention.
- Ability to observe and adjust habitual actions consciously.
Without getting too metaphysical on you, the main thing to understand is this:
You are not your thoughts.
If you can notice your thoughts, it means there's something else there doing the noticing. That's your meta-awareness.
Thoughts come and go all day long, whether you're trying to concentrate or not. Some are helpful. Others unhelpful. But they’re all normal. I view thoughts as natural secretions of the body akin to perspiration and body odour. They just happen (often at the worst time).
So you don't need to try to stop this natural process or change ‘bad’ thoughts to 'good.' You just need to create a sliver of space between yourself and your thoughts. This is what meta-awareness helps you do. It creates some space so you can observe your thoughts as a bystander instead of being wrapped up in them.
The best way for beginners to improve meta-awareness is with this simple exercise:
It will only take you five minutes to do.
- Sit comfortably in a quiet space where you won’t be interrupted. Close your eyes. Feel your breath as you inhale and exhale. Don't adjust the cadence of your breath, just notice its natural rhythm.
- Notice the parts of your body where you can observe your breath. You might focus on your abdomen expanding and retracting with each breath. Or you might feel the air coming in and out of your nostrils. Just choose one spot and put your focus there.
- Now begin counting each breath, silently in your head, on the exhale. On the tenth exhale, start again at one and repeat.
- What you’ll quickly find is that you can't get to ten. By the third or (if you’re lucky) fourth breath, your mind has wandered off. And this is where the magic happens. Each time your mind wanders and you notice it (and you will, eventually), you've just practised meta-awareness. In fact, the more your mind wanders and the more you notice that it did, the better you're doing this exercise.
- Each time you realise that your mind wandered and you lost your count, start again at one.
- I want to emphasise that the goal isn't to get to ten without having your mind wander. So if and when it does, don't be hard on yourself. You noticed your mind wandered. You've done the exercise correctly.
- Also, don't form any opinion about your thoughts. You may think, I suck at this. I can't do this. It's too hard. Don't argue with these thoughts or try to change them. Just notice them. And then start counting back at one.
Practise this for just five minutes a day and you'll begin to understand, through direct observation, just how wild your mind is1. How often it's running around doing its own thing, and how helpful it is to start noticing this; to detach from these runnings around and just observe.
Because it’s only when you become aware of your mind-wandering that you can reduce it when needed.
How does this translate to doing deeply focused work?
Think about it. During the exercise, you've seen how easily your mind wanders away from what you're focused on (counting to ten) but also how you're able to bring it back once you notice. The more you do this, the more you strengthen your attentional control (your ability to intentionally direct your attention).
So the next time you’re doing deep work and remember the lunch you have tomorrow with a friend and how excited you are (and how you’re not sure what to order and how hungry you are right now and…), the quicker you'll notice that this thought isn't relevant to what you're doing right now and you can just set it aside and bring your mind back to the object of your focus.
It might seem damn near impossible to do at first. But with practice and time you’ll develop the neural pathways to make it easier and, eventually, habitual.
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1 If you’ve ever meditated, the exercise I described in this post may be generally familiar. I’m not claiming to have just invented meditation.
