_Question:_ How can I concentrate better?

Sri Chinmoy: Kindly imagine inside your heart a flame. Right now the flame is tiny and flickering; it is not a powerful flame. But one day it will definitely become most powerful and most illumining. So every day before you pray and meditate, try to imagine inside your heart a flame, a burning flame. And please try to imagine that that flame is illumining your mind. You cannot concentrate according to your satisfaction because the mind is not focused. The mind is constantly thinking of many things. It has become a victim of many uncomely thoughts. The mind does not have proper illumination, so imagine a beautiful flame inside your heart, illumining you. Bring that illumining flame inside your mind. Then you will gradually see a streak of light inside your mind. When your mind starts getting illumined, it is very, very easy to concentrate for a long time, and also to concentrate more deeply.

Here is an exercise you can try to improve your concentration. Stand right in front of a wall, and put a dot on the wall right at the level of your third eye. It should be a black dot; you cannot use any other colour. Then you look at the mark. First look at it with your eyes wide open, and then gradually, gradually, close your eyes, but not totally. Try to see the black dot with the least vision of your human eyes. Then open your eyes wide, as large as possible. Make your eyes as wide as possible and then immediately try to make them as tiny as possible, so your vision is next to nothing. Then you repeat this again. After you have succeeded in this, keep your eyes open and try to feel that you are drilling a hole into the wall and entering.

Increase your determination to pierce through the wall. In a few minutes you will see that your body is here, but something of you has passed through the wall to the other side. Your power of concentration has taken you to the other side of the wall. Feel that on this side of the wall is the body, and on that side is the soul-power. The soul-power has gone to the other side of the wall. So from your body you look at your soul, and from your soul you look at your body. Let the body see the soul’s capacity, and let the soul see the body’s eagerness to become one with the soul. If you can do this exercise, your power of concentration will increase immensely and most rapidly.

From:Sri Chinmoy,AUM — Vol.II-5, No. 1, 27 January 1978, Vishma Press, 1978
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