Meditation for concentration: 12-minute letting go session, on exam day

About this practice

Nothing to learn and nothing to fix: 12 minutes of letting go for concentration, on exam day. A guided session of about 12 minutes, suited to all levels. Nothing is recorded and no account is needed.

What this works on: concentration

Concentration fails for two reasons: the task is uninteresting, or the body is too activated to hold anything steady. The second one is fixable in minutes.

It tends to show up as:

• Attention sliding off within seconds
• Jumping between tabs
• Feeling physically unable to sit still

Lowering arousal raises the ceiling of what attention can hold. Practice first, then the task.

Doing this before an exam

• Do it outside the hall, before you go in
• Do not revise during it — that raises the noise
• Aim to arrive early and steady rather than late and reading

Last-minute revision mostly raises arousal without adding recall. Arriving settled is worth more.

How letting go works

Letting go is about loosening grip rather than dropping things. It works on the effort attached to a problem — the holding, rehearsing and bracing — which is separable from the problem itself.

• Pick one thing you are gripping and loosen a single finger
• Release the effort with the exhale, not the issue
• Set down temporarily; you can pick it up again after

What happens, minute by minute

1. 0:00Notice the temperature of the air on the backs of your hands.
2. 0:13Pick one thing you are gripping — a plan, a worry, a grudge — and loosen a single finger.
3. 0:29We'll work through this slowly. If you lose the thread, the thread will wait.
4. 0:43There's a difference between relaxing and stopping. We're aiming for the second one, gently.
5. 0:57Let your ribs widen on the in-breath instead of your shoulders lifting.
6. 1:10Follow one full breath from the moment it starts to the moment it ends.
7. 1:24Now feel both feet at once. That's a lot of contact with the world.
8. 1:38Feel your heart somewhere in there, doing its work without instructions.
9. 1:50Feel your upper arms hanging. They're heavier than you remember.
10. 2:02Let the whole of your right foot be heavy.
11. 2:13You do not have to like the attention that keeps sliding off to breathe through it. Liking was never the requirement.
12. 2:30Whatever the urge to check something else is doing right now, your breathing can keep going underneath it.
13. 2:46Notice how many breaths you take in a minute. Don't change the number, just check.
14. 3:00If you're judging your performance, that's the same habit as judging everything else.
15. 3:13Ask yourself what you could stop holding for the next sixty seconds. That one is a good start.
16. 3:29A few seconds of nothing now. That's on purpose.
17. 3:40If your mind is quiet, don't grab at it. Quiet comes and goes too.
18. 3:54We are not solving anything in the next few minutes. We are setting it down, temporarily.
19. 4:09A gap. Don't rush to fill it with thinking.
20. 4:20If you feel restless, that's a feeling, not a failure.
21. 4:32With each exhale, let a little of the effort go. Not the problem — just the effort.
22. 4:47Let's pause. Just the breathing for a while.
23. 4:58Notice the moment you realise you've drifted. That moment is the whole skill.
24. 5:11Setting something down is not the same as giving up. You can pick it up again after.
25. 5:26I'll step back. You stay here.
26. 5:36If your body wants to move, let it move, then come back.
27. 5:49Let the in-breath be short and the out-breath unhurried.
28. 6:00Keep following the air.
29. 6:09Notice your eyebrows. They're probably doing something small right now.
30. 6:21Let the breath get soft, the way it goes when someone is reading beside you.
31. 6:35Let it be this simple.
32. 6:44Notice your shoulders, one at a time. The left one first.
33. 6:56Let each breath out be a small letting go of the muscles around your ribs.
34. 7:10Let your body keep settling.
35. 7:19Notice your heels making contact with the floor or the bed.
36. 7:31Feel the air move past your upper lip. It's the coolest spot on the way in.
37. 7:46Stay a moment longer than is comfortable.
38. 7:56Notice your ribs on both sides. Wide, not squeezed.
39. 8:07Nothing about the difficulty of staying with one thing has to be explained or justified in this room.
40. 8:23A short silence. Let it be empty.
41. 8:33When the attention that keeps sliding off arrives, name it once, quietly, and go back to the breath. Naming is not fixing, and that is fine.
42. 8:52Follow the breath down into your belly and feel it come back up.
43. 9:05Notice the space around the urge to check something else. It is there, even if it is small. Put your attention in that space.
44. 9:24Remind yourself, slowly: I am safe in this moment, even while the difficulty of staying with one thing is here. Safety and difficulty can share a room.
45. 9:44Let the out-breath be a little longer than the in-breath, without forcing it.
46. 9:57If you feel numb, that's a valid thing to feel. Nothing to fix.
47. 10:10Notice if your attention is in the future. Bring it back to the room.
48. 10:24Silence. Let your shoulders drop again if they've crept up.
49. 10:36You have been carrying this competently for a while. A few minutes off will not undo that.
50. 10:51Let this one be unhurried.
51. 11:00Stand up when you're ready. The list hasn't grown while you were here.
52. 11:13Give your hands a stretch before you go back to using them.
53. 11:26A few seconds more.

Questions people ask

Meditation is a practice, not a treatment. If you are dealing with ongoing distress, please also reach out to a professional.