Protecting Attention: Nurturing Your Inner Garden of Joy and Beauty
Attention is one of the most powerful forces in our lives. When you give your full attention to a child, you can see them light up. Look closely at a flower, and you will glimpse the same beauty that lives within you. One of my heroes, Psychologist Carl Rogers described the healing power of unconditional positive regard—the quality of presence that makes another person feel completely and unconditionally seen, accepted, and understood. Whether it’s a child or a flower, everything blooms when we offer it our full attention.
The challenge today is that between work, parenting, school, social media, streaming platforms, and the endless flow of data and technology, our attention has become highly fragmented. t’s not only common, but often expected, to manage multiple screens, tasks, and conversations at once just to keep pace with modern life. True, focused attention has become increasingly difficult to cultivate. This can make us feel scattered, anxious, and disconnected from what gives our lives meaning.
The Mental Health Toll of a Scattered Mind
Our brains evolved over millions of years to respond to a natural world that changed slowly. For most of human history, new stimuli were rare, and when something novel appeared, it usually signaled a potential threat or opportunity essential for survival. In that environment, bursts of novelty activated our attention and stress systems just long enough to help us adapt or respond.
Today, the same neural circuitry is being hijacked. We scroll and sift through hundreds of pieces of new information each day. Each notification or headline triggers the same ancient networks designed to detect danger, keeping our nervous systems in a constant state of alert. The result is a brain wired for focus and survival trying to function in a world of endless stimulation. And we’re paying the price—with exhaustion, anxiety, and a diminished capacity for deep, sustained attention.
Even when we don’t consciously feel stressed, the constant stream of information keeps our nervous system subtly activated. The body never fully transitions into the parasympathetic state, which is the mode responsible for recovery and restoration. Instead, we hover in a mild but persistent state of sympathetic activation, which is often described as a low-level fight-or-flight response.
The result is that we feel restless, tired, and uneasy, often without understanding why. This continual toggling between tasks and inputs taxes the prefrontal cortex—the area responsible for focus, planning, and emotional regulation—leading to cognitive fatigue, irritability, and a sense of disconnection from ourselves and others.
Research shows that our capacity for sustained attention is declining. Studies led by Dr. Gloria Mark at the University of California show that the average person now switches tasks roughly every forty-seven seconds, compared to about two and a half minutes just two decades ago.
ADHD diagnoses have also risen worldwide, particularly since the pandemic. For instance, in Finland, new ADHD diagnoses nearly doubled, with the sharpest increases present among women and young adults. A recent Lancet report described a similar global trend, suggesting that our modern environment—characterized by overstimulation, divided attention, and relentless digital input—may be amplifying vulnerabilities in the neural circuits that govern attention and self-regulation. This research suggests that the conditions we live in today are training the brain to be distractible.
For some individuals, challenges with focus and sustained attention have always been part of their neurobiology. ADHD is not a flaw or deficit—it’s one natural expression of how the human brain allocates attention and processes information. But in a world that rarely permits rest or pause, even the most focused among us are operating near the limits of our cognitive capacity. What may once have been a manageable variation in attention now feels amplified by the unrelenting pace and sensory demands of modern life.
Our nervous systems did not evolve for this pace of exponential technological growth. Instead, over millions of years, the human brain and body calibrated themselves to the slow, predictable rhythms of the natural world—the rising and setting of the sun, the turning of seasons, the steady cadence of breath and heartbeat. Now, we move through days that outstrip our biology. You can sense it in your body and the effort required to keep pace with a world accelerating faster than your physiology can adapt to.
The Inner Garden of the Mind
Attention is one of the most powerful forces within us. Our outer world reflects the state of our inner one—and that’s why this crisis of attention is both concerning and profound.
One of my favorite Zen teachers, Thích Nhất Hạnh, taught that the mind is like a garden: every thought, emotion, intention, and perception is a “seed”. Whatever you “water” with your attention will grow. If you water fear, comparison, and distraction, those seeds will flourish. If you water calm, compassion, and understanding, those qualities will grow instead.
This principle applies to everyone, including those with ADHD. Attention is a trainable system—one that can be strengthened through deliberate practice. In ADHD, attention tends to move quickly and respond strongly to novelty, but that same sensitivity also makes the brain highly adaptable. Through engagement, interest, and consistency, the neural circuits that support focus and regulation can be reshaped. The “garden of the mind” isn’t just a metaphor—it’s a reflection of neuroplasticity itself. What we focus our attention on, we grow.
In other words, attention is like sunlight in that garden—whatever we shine it on, we help bring to life. Each moment, we’re choosing what to nurture. That’s why it’s so important to be intentional about where we place our attention. It shapes the quality of our days, our relationships, and our inner lives. Attention is not just a skill; it’s a form of care—something to be protected and cultivated.
Five Simple Ways to Protect and Strengthen Your Attention to Cultivate Greater Joy and Beauty in Your Life
Attention is a living capacity you can nurture. Here are five ways to strengthen it:
1. Clarify and be intentional what matters most.
Be intentional with your attention. You can’t give your attention to everything in your life. Choose what matters. Take time to reflect on what’s most important to you and give those things your energy first. Write down what you want more of in your life—qualities, people, relationships, skills—and make regular space for them.
2. Do one thing at a time.
Our society glorifies productivity and speed. It pressures you to keep up and can leave you feeling like you’re constantly falling behind and running on a neverending hamster wheel. At least once a day, give yourself permission to move at your own pace—one task at a time. There’s something deeply calming, and deeply satisfying, about doing one thing well, with your full presence, before moving to the next.
3. Honor your natural rhythms.
Make your well-being a priority. Everything has a cost, and when you push past your body’s limits, that cost is paid in stress, exhaustion, and health. There is no escaping this. The cost will be paid eventually, even if not now. Few things are worth the erosion of your vitality. Give yourself permission to take up space for what your body needs. Live more like the Europeans—make time for rest, savor your meals, linger in conversation, and honor balance as deeply as productivity.
4. Practice daily meditation.
Meditation is simply the practice of bringing your attention back to this moment, which is the only real moment that exists. There’s something profoundly soothing about being here now. Over time, it strengthens your capacity to focus and rest in presence. You might also try visualization and spend a few minutes picturing a place where you feel completely at ease. It could be somewhere real or imagined. This simple practice can calm your nervous system and nurture both your mind and body.
5. Engage your senses.
Feel the warmth of the sun on your face. Listen to the wind in the trees. Hug your child. Attention lives not only in the mind but also in your body.
Each of the above steps can also be encouraged in your children and teens. Help them notice how good it feels to care for themselves—to move their bodies, rest, and eat well. Empower them to enjoy the feeling of being healthy and to recognize what well-being feels like from the inside out. Encourage them to connect with life at their own pace, even when society constantly pressures them to do otherwise.
In closing…
Attention leads to presence, and presence, in the end, is what makes us feel most alive. To cultivate attention is to awaken to yourself, to others, and to life itself.
Our attention shapes the landscape of our inner world. When we tend to our inner world with care—like a garden—it becomes fertile ground for clarity, peace, and connection, both to yourself and to others. Caring for our attention is something to protect, because it’s how we remember who we are, and how we own our presence and aliveness.
In closing, here are some questions to reflect on in your own life:
Where is your attention when you feel most alive?
What does that tell you about how you want to live?
What meaning might you cultivate if you tended the garden of your mind with intention and care?
What are you watering with your attention today?
Wishing you much joy and peace,
