Why Practice Self-Directed Attention?

The Just One Look Method is a two-part process. Those two parts are the act of Looking at Yourself and the Self-Directed Attention Exercise.

The act of Looking at Yourself resets the mind and triggers a period of recovery in which the mind restructures itself, in a context that is no longer based on the fear of life itself. For the process to start, just one look is enough.

The second part, the practice of Self-Directed Attention, is fundamental in the recovery.

After getting a taste of their actual self (their me-ness), those who work to develop control over their attention gain self-reliance, agency, and confidence in their ability to see for themselves what is needed, what is not, and what doesn’t matter in any circumstance. They do not hesitate to ask for help when they need it. They are active participants in the process, and the time they spend in recovery seems to be around two and a half years.

For those who do the looking but decline to work to gain control over their attention, recovery seems to last at least five years. That time is often filled with misery, and they have little to say about the experiences they go through as the mind restructures itself without their conscious participation. Some even seem to think that our work is just a newer version of the spiritual practice methods they have tried before, and they miss the unique power of Just One Look, which offers understanding and self-reliance rather than magic.

And those who do acquire a conscious understanding of the process and develop their skill in the simple exercise of attention that we recommend come to see just how easy and deeply satisfying it is to be able to decide for themselves whether to accept the mind’s suggestions, ignore them, or even do away with them for good. They regain the agency that was buried in the context of fear that used to determine everything about their relationship with their mind and their lives.

Once trained in the skillful control of their attention, and in the absence of the cloak of fear, the light of that understanding guides them reliably throughout the rest of their lives.


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