I.19 — The Wandering

Sit for even a minute and the mind will leave the breath. It will go to a list, an argument from days ago, a stray tune, nothing at all. This is not failure. It is not even news. It is the mechanism the practice runs on, the way a lung's whole job includes emptying.

Think of teaching a young dog to walk beside you without pulling. It pulls. Of course it pulls, pulling is what an untrained thing does. Nobody curses it for pulling. You notice the leash has gone tight, and you bring it back to your side, again, without drama, as many times as the walk requires. The training is not in the walking without pulling. It is in the bringing-back.

Attention works the same way. The wandering is not the opposite of the practice, the return is the practice, and the wandering is simply what makes a return possible at all. Every time the mind drifts and is noticed and is brought home to the breath without a lecture attached, the instrument gets a little more responsive.

So when it wanders today, and it will, skip the scolding. Notice, and come back. Do that ten times in one sitting and the practice has happened ten times, not failed once.