Softening for concentration: 20 minutes, on the train

About this practice

When concentration shows up on the train, this 20-minute softening session gives you somewhere to put it down. A guided session of about 20 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 on your commute

• Headphones on, eyes open or closed depending on your comfort
• Keep one part of your attention on your stop
• Do it standing if sitting is not possible — nobody is watching

Commuting time is already dead time. Nothing is being given up.

How softening works

Softening is the practice of releasing held tension degree by degree rather than all at once. It targets the physical grip — shoulders, jaw, gut — that persists long after the stressor has passed.

• Soften one place per exhale rather than everything at once
• Let warmth and gravity do the work instead of muscular effort
• If a place will not soften, leave it and go somewhere that will

What happens, minute by minute

1. 0:00Check your hands. Are they doing anything? Let them stop.
2. 0:12Unclenching is not the same as relaxing. Just stop adding the tension back.
3. 0:25Let the breath get a little quieter, as if you were trying not to wake someone sleeping nearby.
4. 0:41Notice the weight of your arms without moving them.
5. 0:52Breathe in through your nose and out through your nose, if that's comfortable.
6. 1:05Let your breathing get quieter rather than deeper.
7. 1:16Start at the top of your head. Notice the scalp, which you almost never notice.
8. 1:30Feel the skin around your eyes. Let the muscles behind them go loose.
9. 1:43Notice the small movement in your belly when you breathe.
10. 1:55Feel your hips. Wide, heavy, and doing nothing.
11. 2:06Let the whole of your left foot be heavy.
12. 2:17Think of the urge to check something else as a guest that arrived without knocking. You can let it stand in the hallway.
13. 2:35Let the exhale carry a little of the difficulty of staying with one thing with it. Not all of it. Just a little, one breath at a time.
14. 2:55Let the breath be slow enough that you can hear it, just barely.
15. 3:08When 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.
16. 3:27Notice where the urge to check something else lives in your body. Chest, throat, stomach. Rest your attention there without trying to change it.
17. 3:46Feel your breath move down your back, all the way to your lower ribs.
18. 4:00If your mind is quiet, don't grab at it. Quiet comes and goes too.
19. 4:14With every out-breath, soften one place. Shoulders first, then jaw, then the space behind the eyes.
20. 4:29Silence. Let your shoulders drop again if they've crept up.
21. 4:41Notice if you've been frowning at your own thoughts.
22. 4:52If a place will not soften, leave it alone and go somewhere that will. It often follows.
23. 5:07I'll step back. You stay here.
24. 5:17Notice the difference between a thought and the space around it.
25. 5:29We are not forcing anything open. We are letting things unclench by a single degree.
26. 5:43I'll be quiet for a moment. Stay with the breath.
27. 5:55If you're counting the minutes, that's fine. Count them and come back.
28. 6:08Find the tightest place and simply breathe near it. Warmth does the softening, not effort.
29. 6:22No words for a moment. Only the next breath.
30. 6:33Notice if you're being hard on yourself about any of this.
31. 6:45A few seconds more.
32. 6:54Let the breath be shallow if shallow is what your body wants.
33. 7:07Feel the back of your neck. That's a place that holds a lot.
34. 7:20A few seconds of nothing now. That's on purpose.
35. 7:31Notice any tension that arrived while you weren't looking.
36. 7:42Take the next breath slowly.
37. 7:51Let your breathing find the rhythm it uses when you're almost asleep.
38. 8:04Notice your shoulders, one at a time. The left one first.
39. 8:16I'll leave a gap here. Use it however you like.
40. 8:28Notice the moment you realise you've drifted. That moment is the whole skill.
41. 8:41Let it be this simple.
42. 8:50Let the breath move at the speed of a sleeping person.
43. 9:02Let your thumbs rest wherever they landed.
44. 9:12A gap. Don't rush to fill it with thinking.
45. 9:23If your mind has wandered, that's not a mistake. Noticing is the practice.
46. 9:36Feel your palms. Warm or cool, either is fine.
47. 9:47Let your breathing be boring. Boring is good here.
48. 9:58Keep following the air.
49. 10:07If you're replaying a conversation, let it play. It'll finish on its own.
50. 10:20Silence for a few breaths. Nothing to do in it.
51. 10:32Let your whole body be as heavy as it wants to be.
52. 10:45Let the exhale fall out rather than pushing it.
53. 10:56Just the breath, still.
54. 11:05Notice any part of you that wants this to be over.
55. 11:17A short silence. Let it be empty.
56. 11:27Feel the front of your chest. Notice it rise and fall once.
57. 11:40Let your shoulders stay still while your ribs move.
58. 11:51Nothing changes for a moment.
59. 12:00Notice any urge to check something. You can wait two more minutes.
60. 12:13Nothing to follow for a moment except your own breathing.
61. 12:25Now the right shoulder. Let it be a centimetre lower than it was.
62. 12:38Follow one full breath from the moment it starts to the moment it ends.
63. 12:52Let the quiet do its work.
64. 13:02Feel the tops of your thighs.
65. 13:12Let the out-breath be a little longer than the in-breath, without forcing it.
66. 13:25Stay here a little longer.
67. 13:34Feel your forearms, from the elbow down to the wrist.
68. 13:46Notice the first breath of the day versus this one. They're the same mechanism.
69. 14:00No need to open your eyes yet.
70. 14:10Feel your calves, front and back.
71. 14:20Notice that you don't have to start a breath. It arrives by itself.
72. 14:33Stay a moment longer than is comfortable.
73. 14:43Notice your ears, which mostly just receive things.
74. 14:54You do not have to win against the difficulty of staying with one thing. You only have to breathe until the next moment arrives.
75. 15:13Quiet now. The next part will wait for you.
76. 15:24Picture the attention that keeps sliding off as a weather front passing over. You are not the weather. You are the sky it moves through.
77. 15:43Notice the small pause before your body decides to breathe in again.
78. 15:56If the urge to check something else starts telling you a story, let the story finish without you adding to it.
79. 16:13There is no correct amount of the difficulty of staying with one thing to be feeling right now. Whatever is here is the honest amount.
80. 16:32If you're holding your breath at the top, stop. There's no need to hold anything.
81. 16:46the attention that keeps sliding off may quiet down, or it may not. Either is fine. We are practising staying, not performing calm.
82. 17:04Nothing about the urge to check something else has to be explained or justified in this room.
83. 17:19Feel the air move past your upper lip. It's the coolest spot on the way in.
84. 17:34Notice the tone of your own inner voice. Is it kind?
85. 17:46Notice how you're sitting. Adjust if you need to. Then settle again.
86. 17:59You might be planning something. Notice the planning, then come back.
87. 18:11I'll stop for a moment. Take the pause at your own speed.
88. 18:24Let the exhale do the work. On each one, allow a little more give.
89. 18:38Stay with it.
90. 18:46Let the next breath be the start of the rest of the day.
91. 18:59When you're ready, look around properly.
92. 19:09No rush to move on.

Questions people ask

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