Mental training

If you have ADHD, meditation is medicine.

After some fumbling around this year, I’m 100% convinced—a meditation practice is the only way to rewire your brain to consistently focus on what’s important. Not another productivity app or hack. Not another guru with a new course. And not another must-watch YouTube video.

I’ve struggled to focus for most of my life. Unless something pulls me into a rabbit hole, my brain tunes it out like empty status updates in a stand-up meeting. My monkey mind can’t stand the boringness of bureaucracy, so I end up multitasking, checking Slack, socials, and emails—searching for something more stimulating.

But recently something changed when I started taking meditation seriously.

Before, I was doing 10 minutes a day using the Waking Up app. It helped to an extent, but I wasn’t seeing gains with this minimal effort. The benefits slowed down after a few weeks. So after reading, The Mind Illuminated, I started to treat meditation as mental weightlifting.

Your attention is like a muscle. Right now, it’s weak from years of dopamine scrolling. Each meditation session is like training at the mind gym.

And just like in the gym, if you do the same routine without progressive overload, you hit a plateau. Don’t associate real training with some b.s. like “muscle confusion.” I’m talking about intentional, consistent effort scaled over time. Treat meditation like a workout session.

• More weight = more intention before sitting.

• More reps = more time meditating.

• More sets = more sessions or techniques to try.

Why should you train? For complete self-control. So you can tell ADHD to f*ck right off. To put the stupid ego on a leash and make it work for you.

The results? I’ve been able to write this after 10 days of focused practice. I slept well, meditated this morning, and crushed two 90-minute work blocks—something I haven’t done in months.

Beyond the focus gains, there are spiritual implications I’m still exploring. More on this later.

If you’ve said that, it’s a clear sign you’re overstimulated and underperforming. You’re riding the high of a dopamine wave. Could look like a scrolling addiction.

I thought the same thing a few months ago when I skipped sessions to “get things done.”

But here’s the thing: Everything has more flavor when you’re mindfully locked in. You don’t look at normal things the same way. The smell of coffee, the sound of wind, the feeling of air on your skin. They become richer when your nervous system isn’t constantly chasing the next dopamine hit.

Meditation destimulates the need for constant novelty. Your baseline resets. Life becomes vivid again.

Now maybe you’re thinking: “I don’t have time.” Nah, you don’t have time to waste. Meditation gives you time back by cutting out the distractions you let steal it. Mental training teaches you to overcome resistance—the biggest demon plaguing you from evolving. Resolve to sit anyway.

Because in life, you’re gonna face sh*t you feel like you can’t handle in that moment.

• Anger because your expectations weren’t met—you planned your whole day but someone f*cked it up.

• Impatience because you aren’t seeing results right away—you saw John post on Facebook about his new gains and think you’re a complete failure.

• Doubt because you’ve been conditioned to be cautious about everything—you’re sucked into politics and the news for the sake of being informed.

I’m not saying meditation cures all that but it helps to manage it. Why become a slave to these things when you can call the shots on your own?

“But I need more discipline.”

Find motivation daily and discipline comes easy.

I tapped into a meditative joy/absorption this morning.

It happened quicker than the usual 18-20 minute mark per usual (sometimes not at all).

What motivates me to meditate right now is the ability to develop something like Ki Control. In Dragon Ball Super, Goku needs to control his spirit energy to hold a new super saiyan god transformation. This practice is no different.

But it becomes stronger with training. Little things like that keep you motivated and then discipline follows.

Tie your next goal to your favorite anime or movie and watch how you respond.

Next thing you know, you’ve reached another level and you’ve become a new person. Your life changes one moment at a time.

Call it compound interest for mental gains.

If you’ve felt off lately, I don’t blame you. Times are changing with evolving technology and growing conveniences.

As we get older the lines start to blur from year to year and moment to moment. We lose the novelty that we once had as kids where time seemed to slow down at every instant of a fresh experience.

Like mom’s home-cooked breakfast as you woke up Saturday morning.

The smell of the ocean when you arose from a nap in the truck ride to the beach, while the sounds of seagulls sparked a sign in your brain that, “we’ve arrived in a new world.”

Well, at least a place not so familiar to home, school, and video games. Your senses are primed for more new experiences as a child.

Meditation brings back those sensations of new—moment-to-moment appreciation of the here and now. Every second you’re aware of is an event worth paying attention to. No more blurred lines that go forgotten during the same old lifeless work days.

You’ve become aware and alive again. You’re back in your soul. “It’s a me.” This is it.

Sure, I’m meditating as a practice to achieve a goal.

But the benefits go beyond that. They bring me this bliss, in moments sat on the cushion, back to reality.

I may not have it locked in yet as a default state, but every practice is a chance to make it who or what I am again. Until my soul is fully colored “here now.” Until I’m no longer professing, “I am Brand,” but instead, “I AM.”

There’s a burning intuitive feeling in my gut that meditation is not just for mental gains but a spiritual discipline. As the world grows closer to AI and material speed, I feel the need to return to a slower, calmer pace.

One that is only possible with the stillness and peace that meditation and prayer bring.

Call it intuition or a gift from the Holy Spirit, I feel God has been calling me to grow from the inside out. Starting with my intention to do so.

Stay clear, calm, and creative,

Brand M.

P.S.

Meditation is an ongoing journey, that doesn’t necessarily end. But it’s been transformative for me.

So I’m curious, do you meditate? What are your thoughts on it?

There’s the path of enlightenment where you can go to the most extreme goal of using meditation to achieve god-like states of mind. Does this interest you?

However controversial to my Christian friends, I welcome the discussion.

Let me know!