Improving Attentional Control

In a world of instant access to gratification, non-stop stimulation, and a determination to keep your focus dully fixated on the next big TV show or TikTok, wanting to improve your ability to thrive must be a decision you make every day. Luckily for us, there are some very useful tricks and techniques we can use in our day-to-day goings-on that can greatly mediate the impact our world has on us. And in 2022, I think this is the signature of the resilient individual; to be able to participate in the world without unnecessarily suffering the many consequences that come with it.

One such target for those who wish to protect themselves from the wasting effects of endless content and computational algorithms whose sole job is to constantly pull your attention like a horse with a carrot is attentional control. Improving attentional control appears to be one of the greatest cognitive skills that we can have going forward into an increasingly technologically bound world.

What exactly is attentional control?

Well, simply put, it’s your ability to control your attention. It may seem like a complex or esoteric concept, but rest assured, I’ve written many articles on the topic if you wish to read more about it; you’ll find them on the article page here. So I’ll just give you the coles notes version here.

Attentional control is your brain’s ability to selectively inhibit and ignore the countless streams of incoming information that you would otherwise experience during any given moment while maintaining focus on 1 stream, or a set of tightly paired streams of incoming information. For example, we have our senses (taste, touch, smell, vision, hearing), information from our body (blood pressure, heart rate, respiration rate, digestion, excretion, muscular tension, joint position etc…), and information from the outside world (light, shapes, colours, sounds, people, objects, relationships, responsibilities etc…). Our brain tends to do a pretty good job of highlighting just a few streams of relevant information while inhibiting all other streams. If we were unfortunate enough to have even a few seconds of experiencing all of that information at once, we would go mad. I imagine it would be pure static. Like being in a white-out snowstorm; you know there’s a lot going on, but you can’t make sense of anything. People who have experienced anxiety might be able to imagine a small % of what this may feel like.

So thank goodness for all our cognitive processes and neural substrate that is dedicated to keeping that from happening.

Now think of what your environment looks like on any given day, you probably have your phone, social media account, relationships, priorities, work, deadlines, dreams, desires, fears etc… That’s a lot to think about! It’s no wonder anxiety rates are skyrocketing, we have so many things to focus on and if that’s not enough, our world is designed in a way to override our ability to self direct our attention.

We have been given more things to focus on, and simultaneously have had our means to focus on those things severely reduced.

The answer to this problem is to improve our attentional control.

Improving your ability to consciously direct your attention might be easier than you think. Just like if we want to get stronger biceps, we do exercises that use and challenge our biceps. Building attentional control is no different.

And luckily for us, there are many “objects” we can use to strengthen attentional control, but I’ve always been drawn to using breathing as the target of focus. Mostly because it’s always available, and I quite enjoy all the other benefits of focusing on breathing such as calming and improved focus effects.

How to Improve Attentional Control

Choose your object, be it breathing, an object in your environment like a candle, or anything else that is salient enough for it to stand out in your mind.

Focus on that object, and hold your attention on it. If you’ve chosen breath as your object of focus, feel it as deeply as you can as it enters and exits your nose. And when you notice your attention shift to something else; “What’s for dinner? I wonder what Abbey is doing right now. Oh shoot, I’ve got to call my friend back”, just notice that your attention drifted, and reorient your attention to your object. Set a timer and try that for 5 minutes.

Try to avoid getting irritated when you notice your mind has drifted, this is literally the main aspect of the exercise. Just like you do repetitions of bicep curls to make your biceps stronger, imagine this focus-drift-refocus task as a repetition. Every time you focus, drift, and refocus, consider that a rep that is building your focus muscles. So if you find that you’re getting irritated, just remind yourself that no one is good at something they’ve never done before, especially attentional control.

That’s it!

If you’re interested in learning more about the actual mechanics and the goings-on under the hood, I’ve written many articles on the neuroscience of focus, breathing, and the countless benefits that come from improving your ability to consciously direct your attention in a world that is devoted to pulling your attention every which way.