Is this not a form of meditation? I've never been able to keep a meditation habit, but my understanding is that meditation techniques often feature closing your eyes and focusing on breathing, body parts or some other irrelevant thing, it sounds like staring at a wall would serve the same purpose.
As someone who's maintained a meditation practice since 2013, this is definitely meditation.
And by "maintain a practice", I mean it's more like something I return to with frequency and less a daily compulsion.
Focusing on the breathe or ambient sounds is "easy", and is precisely the reason meditation is seemingly difficult. The mind craves more than simplicity; for some this occurs after a few seconds, for others after a few minutes...it all depends on the day. Learning to observe when the mind wanders is one part of the practice. Labelling the quality of thought that caused the wandering (planning, worrying, visualizing, replaying, etc)and returning to the simpler act of focus on breathe or sounds is another part of the practice.
This article is very much the author discovering some variation of meditation; if they feel the need to "invent" something and share it in a blog post...then here's hoping it promotes more people to give it a shot and maybe it'll lead to at least one person developing a new practice for themselves.
it almost is but meditation, is done with more intent.
In Zen Buddhism for example you are always striving to increase awareness, by constantly monitoring your internal monologue, pulling yourself back from day dreaming, expanding from focus on the breath to all near by sensation and phenomena.
True meditation, in the zen sense, is an order of magnitude more difficult to do consistently, and takes intense willpower.
staring at a wall is basically the zen practice of shikantaza [1], except you’re not staring, it’s more of an eyes half closed yet alert gaze. you don’t do anything, not even counting the breath. you just sit, that’s the entire practice. in my experience, the more you intellectualize it, the more difficult it becomes!
After reading your comment, I was reminded of my first and last visit to a zen meditation center where we had to meditate by staring at a wall sitting on some sort special cushion designed for this sort of meditation.
Seems like it would be better and easier to just take a walk instead. Whenever you feel information overload, it's time for a break: step outside, get some fresh air, stretch your legs, etc. Not a panacea, obviously, just common sense. Staring at a wall while forcing your mind to "think of nothing"... maybe try it once and see how it goes.
> Seems like it would be better and easier to just take a walk instead.
Unfortunately for many, and few managers will admit it even though it's true - there is a performative aspect to physical presence at work. Being away from your desk, idle on slack, etc to go take that walk is a problem in many work environments.
Probably one reason why SWEs are disproportionately interested in FIRE.
Going for a run helped formulate so many of my best ideas and solved so many tricky problems I was facing. It was always one of three places: on a run, in the shower, or right before falling asleep.
I feel like this is on to something. I remember earlier in my career whenever I hit a really, really hard problem I'd have an instinct to try to stare of into the far distance (especially if there's like a distant skyline) and sort of zone-out. It was like shower-thinking or almost sleeping, and then come back with a deeper understanding of the problem.
Psychology research backs this up -- I think there are studies that show students who have a break between two classes before better in both classes (it's called interference).
Anyways it felt weird to me that our work never accommodated this, I think peak performance requires tuning the environment to the human biology, not management optics.
I could never do this. I would forget that I am staring at a wall within 30 seconds.
The suggestion of going for a walk at least means when you get absorbed by something in your mind, you are still out on a walk, You can't just turn around and start working on some new idea if you are out on a path somewhere.
it could probably work as well to close your eyes instead of staring at a wall.
i've always found meditation types revolving around focusing on one thing (candle, wall etc), or nothing (empty mind) to be really hard. my mind just wanders and i end up super anxious, frustrated, and exhausted - resulting in me giving up pretty quickly
What I've found is that focusing on "everything" - ie sitting still and trying to observe your surroundings, your body, all sounds simultaneously seems to work much better. It's easier to get to a calm state this way.
Also, doing this while walking can also work - but perhaps easier to accidentally start thinking about something else
The idea as far as I understand it is that it’s the point exactly to sit with and process whatever comes up in your mind when you don’t distract yourself. The more often you do it, the more present you become, and the more ability you develop to discriminate between what really is there and what is your imagination/unprocessed memories of the past. The object you focus on merely serves as a still reference point from which you look at what else is showing up (feelings, thoughts, memories).
There will always be anxiety, otherwise you would have processed it already and not hurried away into other activities. It sure feels life-threatening, but as long as you don’t give in to the illusion and remind yourself that it is not, there is no rational reason to jump away. Breathing is a typical way to remind yourself that you are safe in the present environment. And the gift you receive is more and more clarity and a relaxed base state from which to face what’s next.
A lot of people are referencing meditation. Ultimately that's not a terribly well-defined word. It may match some broad ones, but there's a lot of narrow ones that it wouldn't.
If staring at a wall helps then don't let me stop you but I've sometimes done something very similar by just sitting in a chair without any cell phone, book, electronic item, etc. until I'm very bored. Not like "gritting my teeth, come on we can do another 15 minutes let's goooooo" like an exercise push, but definitely waiting past the first couple of twitches of boredom until it's a constant. It's kind of an interesting way to start a vacation, really helps disconnect from work very quickly. It can be some hours, though.
I do find that this only happens for me if I'm "doing nothing". I see others suggesting exercise, or something else, and those are absolutely good in their own way. But they are not the same thing as just doing nothing. It's still trying to do something and "use the time productively".
The downside is that the family just sees a guy sitting there "doing nothing" and can find a dozen reasons to interrupt... it's hard to do this when there are any other people around, and while I'm not an absolutist about a plan that can be summed up as "sit until you can't" without much loss, the interruptions do very quickly diminish the utility. There's a huge difference between sitting uninterrupted for an hour, and sitting for 15 minutes, putting away the dishes, sitting for 15 minutes, getting up to help reach something, sitting for 15 minutes, explaining that yes you really are sitting there just doing nothing would you please just let me do that, and sitting for 15 minutes.
This particular thing doesn't match "meditation" to me, because I'm not even doing the minimal thing meditation involves; I'm not concentrating on breathing, not trying to "not think", not trying to do anything. If the mind races, let it race until it is done racing[1]. In this point in particular this certainly doesn't match a lot of specific meditation traditions. If the thought of doing something occurs to you, that meditation technique of letting it pass through you until it disappears can be useful.
If meditation is a deliberate attempt to slow down, or a deliberate attempt to concentrate on some particular thing, or a deliberate attempt to empty one's mind, it still has a deliberative goal. If you're willing to broaden the term to encompass not even having that much of a plan, then I have no objection. But this feels to me too low level to even justify the term meditation as most people use it. If you're "trying" to do anything at all, then this isn't really what I'm talking about here. I'm not saying this is "better" than meditation, I'm more saying I'm not sure this even rises to that level, as low as some of them may be. It's really just "rest", a concept our century and culture has largely lost track of.
(Of course the obvious semantic argument about "well are you trying to not try, hmmmmmm?" is there and you are free to debate that in your own head, because like I said, I'm not trying to be absolutist about this. This isn't a program I'm proposing so much as an experience report. You do whatever and call it whatever and argue about definitions as much as you like.)
[1]: If your mind literally never stops this may not work for you... that said, in the 21st century, are you sure your mind never stops racing if you just let it run itself to exhaustion? Have you ever tried? It could be some hours, plural. Again, I fully acknowledge that some people reading this can say "yes". I acknowledge the existence of great neurodiversity. But if you've never tried just letting it run itself to exhaustion you may be surprised what happens if you can find the time to let it.
> What I didn’t expect was how difficult it would be. Sitting for 5-10 minutes staring at a wall without thinking of anything is hard! I relate it somewhat to the feeling I have with working out.
So why not combine working out directly instead of staring at a wall? Ride a stationary bike at low zone 2/lower in my experience allow for uninterrupted focus during that time at work. While on bike, the mind shuns distraction and focus on "what's next" in the workstream (distraction includes HN, evidently I haven't gotten on the bike yet).
My homeopathic theory is that I have a total mental energy that is the sum of focused energy and a distracting energy. This distracting energy can be temporarily used at task at hand but it results in mental exhaustion, or left alone it leads to distraction seeking behavior. While on the bike, distracting energy is fully consumed by riding, allowing for focused energy stay focused. If I go above low zone 2, it starts eating into focused energy and I lose efficiency.
Zen meditation for an hour staring at a wall is a marathon that at the end results in a semi-psychedelic state for me.
Exercising and sitting b meditating are two related but seriously different things. Which is why there are many other types of meditation to practice (walking, working, silent, etc) but zen mostly considers sitting and looking at a wall the OG
The same video showed up on my feed last week. I didn't try wall staring, but I did try a day (last Tuesday) with only a single screen active for the entire work day. I was extremely productive that day... but, and I know this is bad, I don't want set expectations too high. So here I type to you on a screen / device that should be turned off.
> A paper published in 2012 showed that in 2008 the average person was receiving 34 GB of information daily, with a daily information exposure growth rate of about 5.4% per year
The paper linked to justify this just talks about media that people consume which is growing. But that has nothing to do with the point this post is trying to make?
Your eyes "stream 4k video" anytime your eyelids are open regardless if you're watching a movie or looking at a wall? Why would me watching more videos say anything about how much information my brain processes?
I understand your point, but a slightly more positive reading might be that the quantity of information consumed, while perhaps unable to be precisely quantified, can be related to the type of content being perceived.
Staring at wall produces little information in and of itself, perhaps through reflection, but staring at a TV produces a load of information, most of which is useless like names of characters, their favorite dresses, what food is being eaten where, etc. You can learn a lot by just passively observing even "dumb" TV especially if it contains foreign content or skills like cooking or sports. Again, not saying all of it is relevant to your life, but that's a different issue.
I don't think "Sitting in an office you sit in every day" or "Sitting in your living room" are the same amount of bandwidth/storage as "Travelling around the moon". I'm sure we have compression algorithms for this stuff and it's somewhat related to novelty.
I'm aware of an association between perception of time to number of photons received in the eyes.
These relate to both how much time the events appear to take subjectively as well as how well remembered they are or how long they feel retrospectively. As in there is an actual physiological explanation for "time flies when you're having fun".
There probably is something to also be said for attention too. Increased awareness and attention will undoubtedly use up more 'bandwidth' or 'storage' too.
Instead of dismissing it, perhaps just give it a try for 15 minutes. Couldn't possibly be worse than watching a mindnumbing 15minute youtube video / tv / reel-type content.
And by "maintain a practice", I mean it's more like something I return to with frequency and less a daily compulsion.
Focusing on the breathe or ambient sounds is "easy", and is precisely the reason meditation is seemingly difficult. The mind craves more than simplicity; for some this occurs after a few seconds, for others after a few minutes...it all depends on the day. Learning to observe when the mind wanders is one part of the practice. Labelling the quality of thought that caused the wandering (planning, worrying, visualizing, replaying, etc)and returning to the simpler act of focus on breathe or sounds is another part of the practice.
This article is very much the author discovering some variation of meditation; if they feel the need to "invent" something and share it in a blog post...then here's hoping it promotes more people to give it a shot and maybe it'll lead to at least one person developing a new practice for themselves.
In Zen Buddhism for example you are always striving to increase awareness, by constantly monitoring your internal monologue, pulling yourself back from day dreaming, expanding from focus on the breath to all near by sensation and phenomena.
True meditation, in the zen sense, is an order of magnitude more difficult to do consistently, and takes intense willpower.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shikantaza
I think your parallel is spot on!
There's one where you are at rest and slowly shift the focus of your gaze from near to middle distance to far away, and back.
It's supposed to be a grounding exercise to bring your mind back to a state of rest and just observing.
This is almost exactly like Transcendental Meditation, even down the to the length of time of ~20 minutes.
Unfortunately for many, and few managers will admit it even though it's true - there is a performative aspect to physical presence at work. Being away from your desk, idle on slack, etc to go take that walk is a problem in many work environments.
Probably one reason why SWEs are disproportionately interested in FIRE.
Psychology research backs this up -- I think there are studies that show students who have a break between two classes before better in both classes (it's called interference).
Anyways it felt weird to me that our work never accommodated this, I think peak performance requires tuning the environment to the human biology, not management optics.
I had a same issue and I found it helped to just step away and blank out in nature.
Also try delaying your first coffee to after the first hour of being awake.
https://unsplash.com/photos/red-bricks-wall-XEsx2NVpqWY
The suggestion of going for a walk at least means when you get absorbed by something in your mind, you are still out on a walk, You can't just turn around and start working on some new idea if you are out on a path somewhere.
it could probably work as well to close your eyes instead of staring at a wall.
i've always found meditation types revolving around focusing on one thing (candle, wall etc), or nothing (empty mind) to be really hard. my mind just wanders and i end up super anxious, frustrated, and exhausted - resulting in me giving up pretty quickly
What I've found is that focusing on "everything" - ie sitting still and trying to observe your surroundings, your body, all sounds simultaneously seems to work much better. It's easier to get to a calm state this way.
Also, doing this while walking can also work - but perhaps easier to accidentally start thinking about something else
There will always be anxiety, otherwise you would have processed it already and not hurried away into other activities. It sure feels life-threatening, but as long as you don’t give in to the illusion and remind yourself that it is not, there is no rational reason to jump away. Breathing is a typical way to remind yourself that you are safe in the present environment. And the gift you receive is more and more clarity and a relaxed base state from which to face what’s next.
But it never ceases to amaze me the consistency and time spent sitting and smiling and other similar endeavors by Benjamin - https://www.youtube.com/@BenjaminBennetttt/streams
If staring at a wall helps then don't let me stop you but I've sometimes done something very similar by just sitting in a chair without any cell phone, book, electronic item, etc. until I'm very bored. Not like "gritting my teeth, come on we can do another 15 minutes let's goooooo" like an exercise push, but definitely waiting past the first couple of twitches of boredom until it's a constant. It's kind of an interesting way to start a vacation, really helps disconnect from work very quickly. It can be some hours, though.
I do find that this only happens for me if I'm "doing nothing". I see others suggesting exercise, or something else, and those are absolutely good in their own way. But they are not the same thing as just doing nothing. It's still trying to do something and "use the time productively".
The downside is that the family just sees a guy sitting there "doing nothing" and can find a dozen reasons to interrupt... it's hard to do this when there are any other people around, and while I'm not an absolutist about a plan that can be summed up as "sit until you can't" without much loss, the interruptions do very quickly diminish the utility. There's a huge difference between sitting uninterrupted for an hour, and sitting for 15 minutes, putting away the dishes, sitting for 15 minutes, getting up to help reach something, sitting for 15 minutes, explaining that yes you really are sitting there just doing nothing would you please just let me do that, and sitting for 15 minutes.
This particular thing doesn't match "meditation" to me, because I'm not even doing the minimal thing meditation involves; I'm not concentrating on breathing, not trying to "not think", not trying to do anything. If the mind races, let it race until it is done racing[1]. In this point in particular this certainly doesn't match a lot of specific meditation traditions. If the thought of doing something occurs to you, that meditation technique of letting it pass through you until it disappears can be useful.
If meditation is a deliberate attempt to slow down, or a deliberate attempt to concentrate on some particular thing, or a deliberate attempt to empty one's mind, it still has a deliberative goal. If you're willing to broaden the term to encompass not even having that much of a plan, then I have no objection. But this feels to me too low level to even justify the term meditation as most people use it. If you're "trying" to do anything at all, then this isn't really what I'm talking about here. I'm not saying this is "better" than meditation, I'm more saying I'm not sure this even rises to that level, as low as some of them may be. It's really just "rest", a concept our century and culture has largely lost track of.
(Of course the obvious semantic argument about "well are you trying to not try, hmmmmmm?" is there and you are free to debate that in your own head, because like I said, I'm not trying to be absolutist about this. This isn't a program I'm proposing so much as an experience report. You do whatever and call it whatever and argue about definitions as much as you like.)
[1]: If your mind literally never stops this may not work for you... that said, in the 21st century, are you sure your mind never stops racing if you just let it run itself to exhaustion? Have you ever tried? It could be some hours, plural. Again, I fully acknowledge that some people reading this can say "yes". I acknowledge the existence of great neurodiversity. But if you've never tried just letting it run itself to exhaustion you may be surprised what happens if you can find the time to let it.
So why not combine working out directly instead of staring at a wall? Ride a stationary bike at low zone 2/lower in my experience allow for uninterrupted focus during that time at work. While on bike, the mind shuns distraction and focus on "what's next" in the workstream (distraction includes HN, evidently I haven't gotten on the bike yet).
My homeopathic theory is that I have a total mental energy that is the sum of focused energy and a distracting energy. This distracting energy can be temporarily used at task at hand but it results in mental exhaustion, or left alone it leads to distraction seeking behavior. While on the bike, distracting energy is fully consumed by riding, allowing for focused energy stay focused. If I go above low zone 2, it starts eating into focused energy and I lose efficiency.
Exercising and sitting b meditating are two related but seriously different things. Which is why there are many other types of meditation to practice (walking, working, silent, etc) but zen mostly considers sitting and looking at a wall the OG
But a wall would probably do just fine as well.
It helps me focus to have just one active “feed”. And I put my phone away when I work to eliminate that screen as potential distraction.
Where I still kinda “fail” is during natural downtime. Like if I’m waiting somewhere, e.g the Dr office, I’ll pull out my phone and browse mindlessly.
The paper linked to justify this just talks about media that people consume which is growing. But that has nothing to do with the point this post is trying to make?
Your eyes "stream 4k video" anytime your eyelids are open regardless if you're watching a movie or looking at a wall? Why would me watching more videos say anything about how much information my brain processes?
Staring at wall produces little information in and of itself, perhaps through reflection, but staring at a TV produces a load of information, most of which is useless like names of characters, their favorite dresses, what food is being eaten where, etc. You can learn a lot by just passively observing even "dumb" TV especially if it contains foreign content or skills like cooking or sports. Again, not saying all of it is relevant to your life, but that's a different issue.
I'm aware of an association between perception of time to number of photons received in the eyes.
These relate to both how much time the events appear to take subjectively as well as how well remembered they are or how long they feel retrospectively. As in there is an actual physiological explanation for "time flies when you're having fun".
There probably is something to also be said for attention too. Increased awareness and attention will undoubtedly use up more 'bandwidth' or 'storage' too.
Show HN: Improve cognitive focus in 1 minute (oneminutefocus.com) 741 points by junetic on Feb 7, 2024 | 287 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39288039
https://oneminutefocus.com/