In your personal experience, what increased the continuity of your awarness?  And what increased the frequency of awareness re-emerging?

- An enjoyable way of paying attention.
- An interest in the nature of experience, not just the content of it.

1. Letting the mind rest wherever it is at the moment. That means not trying to be more mindful/concentrated than I actually am right now. And from there watch the object of awareness (e.g. the breath). This almost automatically leads me to getting more calm and focused.

2. This is linked to 1.: letting go of any tension in body and mind. Like you let go of tension in a muscle.

3. Being more systematic at getting back to awareness whenever distractions arise, i.e. having some kind of small ritual whenever I notice being distracted. For example, when I notice distraction throughout the day I simply greet myself in the present moment ("Hello, there you are! Wanna be mindful for a moment?") and let go of tensions (see 2.) This reduces my tendency to become upset about being distracted. Some people suggest to simply smile whenever you get back to awareness. Something nice like that helps.

4. Instead of fighting distractions simply try to catch as many of those distractive mind moments as possible. But still within the momentary capacity of the mind. If you feel dull, just be aware within that dullness. If you are excited, just be aware within that excitement.

Another thing that has helped where the advices of Ajahn Brahm like the little mantra "This is good enough for me" or putting 100% of the energy into the observer and 0% into the doer.

All these things for me also lead to a higher frequency of awareness re-emerging.

Allowing a wandering mind to be seen as it is and drop as it does.  Having aversion to a wandering mind just creates more mental stories.  I also would remind you that the more attention you pay to the present moment the more of an automatic habit is developed so presence is more effortless.

John Wilde, how have you found enjoyment in paying attention?

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Richard Zen, in paying attention to the present moment:  does this mean allowing the focus of awareness to naturally flicker from sensation to sensation, not directing focus?

I've had a lifelong naïve fascination with experience itself (the fact that any experience is actually happening). Anything that taps into this interest isn't an effort, it's where my mind goes by inclination. Any particular experience can bore me, but the fact that experience is occurring never does. So, no matter what I'm attending to, shifting attention from the content to the medium can always keep things interesting.

Focus does shift constantly. Unless you plow attention into a massively deep jhana it will move. You want to just not let the stories stay on too long.  If you perceive "this object of awareness sucks" and then cling by ruminating "this sucks becuase, because, because...ad nauseum" there is stress. If you let stories that are habitual arise and pass away on their own there is no need to "let go".  Forcibly letting go can contain some aversion that might make more stories in the mind.  

At first you might want to interrupt thinking with a "why" if the clinging is too strong, but it's less stressful and more integrated and efficient to just let them drop on their own because you're not adding more clinging to the habits.  When the thoughts arise and pass like clouds the awareness is already working.  So you're like a normal person that's not in any altered mindstate but you're recognizing that you're already in the present moment and any types of thinking about the practice are just "strategies", "analysis", and a "watcher".  Thinking is habitually acting like a "self".

Does that help?

John Wilde, for "shift attention from content to the medium", I wonder what that means exactly.  I get hung up on medium.  I interpret the meaning of this as:  redirecting the focus of awareness away from a sensation (content), and focused onto awareness of mentally knowing what the sensation is (medium).  Is this an accurate paraphrase to what you decscribed?

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Richard Zen, yes it was helpful, thank you.  I understood your reply as imparting knowledge of how to deal with thought distractions.  It is a rewarding experience to integrate thinking into the periphery of awareness, in the background of focus--like clouds passing.  Do not alter the mind when dealing with thoughts, this is helpful to be reminded of.  I have resisted this knowledge for a long time.  

What do you think of this?:  Awareness is experiencing a sensation in the present moment but not knowing what the sensation is that you are experiencing.  Conscious awareness is experiencing knowing what a sensation is in the present monment. 

If I have awareness of a thought, and then have conscious awareness of the thought, the thought stops.  Awareness seems to go from focusing on the thought itself, to the nature of the space in which the thought exists in.  The thought burns up from illumination.

Have you experienced this same thing before, or know of something similar?

What I found is that when you're lost in thoughts you KNOW that you were.  You haven't gone into amnesia you just filled your working memory with thinking and the surrounding experience is not focused on as much.  Attention is like a spotlight.

I'm not sure. What I mean is a very simple and naïve thing: a recognition that something genuinely amazing is happening right under our noses. It's a shift of interest from what is being experienced to the fact that experience is happening at all. (For most people it's, like, "yeah, so?" I'm less blasé about it. It's something that my mind likes to return to and contemplate when nothing else demands attention).

I bow to you leaf,
I keep rereading
Looking for a spot to start and to stop
Was it there and not?
Was it counted naught?
The moment of realization.

Thanks,
~D

Richard Zen, in my experience using focus, I can experience sensations directly from focusing, and I mean directly by:  flowing in the present moment without lapse.  I cannot focus on the sensation of thought and the knowingness that I am thinking simultaneously.  There can only be one object in focus.  Do you also experience focus in that flickering kind of way if you try to focus on two things at once?  I think this is so for me because I lack the level of power of awareness to have focus and periphery simultaneously.

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John Wilde, that is interesting, I am wondering how you approach meditation.  Could you describe to me your method of meditation?

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Dream Walker, indeed a pleasant loop

Knowing is more simple, automatic and subtle than that.  When you look at a wall you KNOW that you are seeing a wall.  Even the perception that accesses the memory to recognize the object "wall" is very fast.  When you're thinking the knowing of it is not interrupting the thinking. Consciousness is interdependent on objects (including thinking).  If someone asked you later on "were you just thinking about something?" you would be able to tell them yes.

If you want to understand thinking more I did a review of Thinking Fast and Slow which talks about an effortful type of thinking versus the automatic kind.

http://www.dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/5180575

The Bahiya Sutta can be helpful for direct mode of practice:

I'm more of a contemplator than a meditator. I've dabbled with formal meditation techniques but have not stuck with any.

Most of what I call my practice is off cushion. Meditation -- such as it is -- is putting everything else aside so I can give myself completely to contemplation, without distraction. It's not really a goal-driven activity; more like getting drawn into something that's irresistibly interesting. (And how can it not be interesting to be an inconceivable mystery??)

Lately, I've been doing self-inquiry, Direct Path Advaita style. I've been contemplating the notion of pure awareness sans attributes; observing how one can't conceive of awareness without superimposing the properties of objects upon it, or entangling it with attributes of the body-mind. Just contemplating this and seeing how it works is interesting, and it indirectly reveals a lot about the process of identification -- which I think is where its therapeutic value comes from.