10/31/2025
Excellent.
There are so many misconceptions around attention.
Most notably that attention is this sustained capacity that we can will ourselves to hold.
Dr. Amishi Jha writes in her internationally best-selling book, Peak Mind, “You simply cannot decide to pay attention ‘better.’ No matter how much I tell you about how attention works and why, and no matter how motivated you are, the way your brain pays attention cannot be fundamentally altered by sheer force of will.”
Attention is like a muscle that we can train with exercise.
Attention begins with PERCEPTION.
Perception of what externally is important, perception of where our attention currently is, and perception of whether or not those two things match.
When we tell our students to ‘pay attention,’ what we’re really asking them is do they have perception of what we think is important.
