Jun 29, 202210 min read

Meditation for those with ADHD and Other Focus Difficulties

Updated: Sep 29, 2022

If you're one of many people who suffer from anxiety, ADD, ADHD, manic thought cycles, chronic pain, or anything else that may impact your ability to focus or cause a busier-than-average mind, you may find the practice of meditation is much more frustrating than it is for others. If you've read my other article on the importance of having a regular meditation practice and how it can improve your well-being as well as your magickal practice (which I recommend you check out first), you probably already know that meditation can improve the symptoms of all of the above ailments.

Talk about a catch-22. How do you utilize the practice that will help with the issue if the issue is preventing you from utilizing the practice? Don't be dismayed. It may be a little more difficult for those of us who struggle with concentration difficulties, but it's not impossible. Let's cover some ways to get your meditation practice up and running.

Tip #1: Know Your Triggers & Surroundings

You know your own mind, body, and home better than anyone else, and therefore, you should know what triggers your loss of focus. For example, if you have chronic pain that tends to flair up in the evenings, then dedicate time in the morning to meditate when you're experiencing no or fewer symptoms. This may require waking up 10-15 minutes earlier every day, but it's worth it. Further, if light triggers migraines, meditate in the dark. Or if you suffer from tinnitus, silent meditation may not be the best option for you--try deep, loud breathing and/or listening to instrumental music, binaural beats, or nature sounds on headphones (more on this further down).

Set a similar rule for yourself regarding your surroundings. At my previous apartment, every weekday without fail, sometime between 6 and 7pm, one of my neighbors would start their car, it would backfire, and my dog would start barking. Was it annoying? Yes, absolutely. But at least it was a scheduled annoyance. I would simply avoid meditating or doing anything that required unbroken concentration--such as ritual and spell work--during that hour until after I heard the backfire and calmed my dog down.

Tip #2: Set Realistic Time Expectations

One of the easiest ways to sabotage the building of a habit is to make it harder for yourself than it needs to be. Would it be wonderful if we could all just plop down and meditate for 30 minutes at a time without becoming agitated? Sure! Is that realistic? No.

Start off with two minutes. That's it. Set a timer on your phone for two minutes and begin there. It may not seem like much--although in the early stages of starting this practice, those couple of minutes will feel like an eternity--but even short bursts of meditation on a daily basis is better than nothing.

You will also find that you can increase this over time. Remember that meditation is helping you learn a new skill. Let's compare it to exercise: If you've never worked out a day in your life, jogging for even two minutes straight can make you feel like you're about to drop dead. Your legs and lungs are on fire and your heart is beating so fast that you're convinced it's going to collapse in on itself like a dying star. But if you force yourself to jog for two minutes straight on Monday, again on Tuesday, then on Wednesday and Thursday, suddenly by Friday you'll have no problem going for three minutes.

It may seem silly that I'm comparing physical training to training of the mind, but the concept and the way we learn new skills, whether mental or physical, are the same. It's all about repetition and building upon a foundation. So start with the foundation of just two minutes and go from there.

Tip #3: Clearing Your Mind is Active Work

If you've recently read my article Meditation & Magick, you can probably skip this section (in fact, not even gonna lie, I've just copied and pasted this section from it). I hate to be repetitive, but this is probably one of the most important things to remember about meditation: keeping your mind clear is active work.

Many are under the impression that meditation is the practice of sitting down, clearing the mind, and not having a single thought for the entirety of the session. I blame Ron Swanson for that. This misconception leads many to believe that they are incapable of meditating, it leads to frustration and giving up because thoughts just keep. popping. up. But that is actually the entire point of meditation!

It's like this:

Clear mind/find a focus
Several seconds in, think to yourself, "Ah, this is nice. So relaxing. I'm doing it, I can't believe it. Hey, I'm getting good at this. Kind of reminds me of the time I napped on the beach in Grand Cayman. Man, that was relaxing too. I should plan another trip like that soon. Psh, if I can afford it. Flight prices are out of control right now—wait, no! I'm not supposed to be thinking things!"
Take a deep breath
Clear the mind/return to focus
Repeat

There is a reason meditation is called a "practice" and not a "talent" or "skill". You are practicing the skill of noticing when the mind wanders, and then dismissing the thought you aren't supposed to be having. If you practice this regularly, over time you will catch your runaway train of thought faster and dismiss it easier. The beauty of it is, this new skill doesn’t just come into play when you're meditating but in your day-to-day life as well.

Tip #4: Silence is Not a Requirement

I touched on this in tip #2, but let's go a little more in depth. It is yet another misconception that one should meditate in absolute silence. Hey, if that works for you, great. Do yo' thang. But for most of us, silence can be the greatest trigger for runaway thoughts.

Plus, I don't know about the rest of you, but I live on a major cross street and I don't have a soundproof chamber in my home for absolute silence. Fortunately, at this point in my practice I am able to tune the sounds of traffic out, but in the beginning, I had to use headphones. Not only can listening to something during meditation knock out the silence and distracting ambient city noises, but it can even add extra benefits to your meditation sessions as well.

I recommend trying a few of these and see what works for you:

Guided meditation - This is probably the best introductory option. Not only is silence not a factor and you're given a spoken voice to focus on, but that voice is also giving you prompts of scenes to visualize. It's also fairly easy to hop on YouTube and do a quick search for "___ minute guided meditation." I've seen them range anywhere from one minute to two hours. My only recommendation is to eventually move on from here. Guided meditation still provides a lot of external stimuli, and to continue training the brain, you will need to eventually start relying more on yourself. I'll expound further on this in a bit.
Binaural beats - My ears are buzzing just thinking about binaural beats: two tones played at different frequencies, at the same time. I'm no expert on audio, hertz, frequencies, and how they affect the brain, nor is this article the best place to be summarizing an explanation, so I'm just going to drop this handy link here if you'd like more information on how they work. Let me summarize the benefits by telling you that binaural beats can actually alter your brain waves to put you in the best mental condition for meditation. There are countless free apps you can download to access them or search for a specific length or type on YouTube. As with guided audio, I don't recommend this as a permanent solution, if you can eventually graduate past them.
Nature sounds - If you can get yourself to a secluded beach, pond, meadow, forest, or other natural landscape, go for it! But if that's not easy to do on a daily basis, there are numerous apps for nature sounds, most of which allow you to customize what you're hearing. Nature sounds are a peaceful means of cutting out silence and can also help you tune into a specific element if you so desire.
Instrumental music - This is my favorite option. Not only does instrumental music prevent sitting in silence, but it can provide you with an excellent focus. Try breathing in rhythm with the music (careful what you choose, I don't want anyone passing out from hyperventilating to death metal drums 🤘) or tap a finger on your knee to the beat of the song.
Singling out outdoor noises - This technique is a little more advanced, but I say give it a go once you reach a point that sudden noises can be tuned out and aren't as jarring. Open up a window and find just one sound out of the symphony of sounds outside and focus on hearing only that for a while. Tune everything else out. You will still hear the other noises, but you will only pay attention to the single sound you chose. Eventually move on to something else and so on. For example, start off focusing on the sound of wind rustling the leaves on a tree. After you've had your attention entirely focused on that for a bit or when the wind dies down, move on to the sound of cars rushing by (lucky you if you live in a secluded cottage in the woods, but there's no rule that says it has to be all nature noises).

Tip #5: Don't Assume You Have to be Still

Yet another major misconception about meditation is that you have to be seated. In reality, yes, seated meditation is something you want to eventually be able to do (laying down is fine, but it's usually not recommended as it can make you drowsy). However, moving meditation can help you set up the foundational skills needed for a more productive and less frustrating seated meditation practice. Try one or several of these:

Yoga
Tai Chi
Dancing - Either freeform, where you can allow your body to move however it wants to impulsively move, or something choreographed that you have committed to memory.
Running - Preferably on a track or treadmill. Stopping at crosswalks, keeping an eye out for oncoming cyclists, or watching for tree roots and rocks you don't want to trip on can be detrimental to achieving a meditative state.
Walking
Hiking
Cycling
etc.

In regards to yoga and Tai Chi, if you're a beginner to either of those, I recommend using them in addition to another form of meditation. If you're new, you may not know all the poses and their names, and you may need to build the physical flexibility and endurance for them before you can actually utilize them for accessing a meditative state. Once you're somewhat well-practiced, much of the motions will be ingrained as muscle memory and you can perform them freely without stopping to squint at the instructor every few seconds to figure out what the hell is going on.

Side note regarding guided and moving meditations

I'm just going to straight up quote occult author Jason Miller from his blog post "No Replacement for Meditation" as he says it much better than I can rephrase (hope he doesn't mind):

All of these activities are good. All of them can bring you into altered states of consciousness such as trance, ecstasy, or deep calm.

Meditation has NOTHING to do with reaching altered states of consciousness. It ONLY has to do with getting to know your own mind in its most normal and fundamental state.

It is true that you can make yourself mentally absorbed in running, and sports, and other activities that put you into "the zone". You enter this state ONLY because you have made your activity the single focus of your mind and thus you are technically meditating. But here is the problem, if you are doing something active like this to cause you to enter into clarity, then you are locked into doing that thing. What good will it do you in the office when you are in a heated exchange with your boss? Are you going to stop so that you can run around? Of course not.

Real meditation, seated and walking, takes the GOAL AS THE PATH. Clarity cannot be linked to some external activity. You must learn to be clear naturally. After you achieve the state of clarity, you realize that it is actually your normal state.

However, I do include these as options in this article because they can offer a good starting point for those who have a particular, specific difficulty like ADHD that make starting a meditation practice so difficult and so frustrating. Just remember that you do eventually need to graduate beyond and build yourself up to seated meditation.

Tip #6: Practice Mindfulness

You can also begin by finding times throughout the day to practice mindfulness. But let me be clear: mindfulness should be in addition to meditation, not instead of. However, in the special cases I've been outlining in this article, I think that starting with mindfulness and then graduating to a combo of mindfulness and meditation, can make that seated meditation easier.

Mindfulness practices require nothing special and you don't even have to set time aside for it, you just need to tune into the present moment by checking in with your five senses. I find these to be the two easiest times:

When you're eating – Focus on the flavor, the texture, the smell of the food. What is the color of the food you're eating? Can you hear each bite crunch or your fork scraping on the plate?
In the shower – What is the temperature and pressure of the water? Smell your soap and shampoo, see the water clinging to the shower wall, hear it raining against your skin. Is there a lingering flavor of toothpaste or your morning coffee in your mouth?

I can't wrap this article up without a final reminder that much of the above is, as I have already repeated a few times, just a jumping off point: strategies to help you for the first few weeks/months of daily practice while you build your foundation so you can eventually perform 15-20 minutes of seated meditation at a time. Sooner or later, I want you to shake off the training wheels of moving and guided meditation and only use them in conjunction with seated meditation. That is going to be your number one tool for seeing results, and I don't want any of you to fall into the common trap of self-doubt and assume you will always need the extra assistance.

In the meantime, let this guide empower you to do what you can. It's okay if it's slow at first, but with consistent practice and determination you will be able to master meditation.