One of the traditions of meditation is the meditating on one point or object. This may be a candle, or a pain I am feeling in my leg, or a view, or my breath.

We simply turn our attention to the one object -- say, the breath. We are conscious of the fact that there are many other things happening around us besides our in-breath and out-breath, but we do not necessarily shut out those other things; we merely keep our breath at the forefront of our attention. In other words, our awareness is of the breath.

After a while, of course, we realize that our attention has wandered -- we are thinking about some problem at work, or listening to our neighbor starting her car. Something else has moved to the forefront of our attention. Realizing this, we simply move the breath back to the center of our attention. Once more, our awareness is on the breath.

It is important to see that the realization that our attention has shifted is just as much a part of meditating on one point as when we are focused on the breath. Meditation is primarily about awareness.

Of course, feeling at ease doing this will not come in a couple of attempts. Nor did any part of our program.