Monday Meditation: The Quiet Rebellion of Paying Attention
“To take back control of our attention is to reclaim our own lives.”
Monday Meditation: The Quiet Rebellion of Paying Attention
“To take back control of our attention is to reclaim our own lives.”
— Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing
Beloveds,
In a world that devours our gaze, our time, our breath — a world that confuses urgency with importance, noise with meaning, and speed with value — choosing where we place our attention becomes a small but seismic rebellion.
Jenny Odell, in How to Do Nothing, teaches that our attention is not a neutral resource. It is the ground of our relational life, the place where intimacy, imagination, and repair take root. To “do nothing,” she reminds us, is not withdrawal. It is a fugitive refusal — an act of turning away from the algorithms that flatten us and turning toward the living world that calls us back into ourselves.
I think about this often:
how capitalism wants to choreograph every second of our perception,
how empire thrives on distraction,
how white supremacy depends on our detachment from land, body, and community.
When our attention is scattered, we cannot feel the seams of our own becoming.
Fred Moten says that to refuse is not to leave — but to inhabit otherwise. To dwell differently within the given world. And this, for me, is what Odell is after: a different dwelling. A reorientation of our gaze toward what nourishes life rather than what extracts from it.
When I slow down enough to listen for my own sacred hum, something shifts inside me. I begin to notice the subtle chorus of my life:
the cats padding across the floor at dawn,
the rustle of wind across the Hull House porch,
the way hope flickers like candlelight at the bone edges of grief.
This noticing is not passive. It is the beginning of repair.
Baldwin said, “Nothing can be changed until it is faced.” And we cannot face what we do not notice. We cannot heal what we never turn toward. We cannot liberate what we refuse to see.
I am learning, poco a poco, that attention is a kind of love.
To pay attention to my breath is to return home.
To pay attention to the land is to remember I belong.
To pay attention to each other is to practice a future that refuses the loneliness empire depends on.
In this moment of global unraveling, Odell’s invitation lands as both ancient and new:
Turn your attention toward what is life-giving.
Let it reshape you from the inside out.
Let it be a portal into a slower, more honest way of being human.
This is the practice of queer ecology — the mestiza attention Anzaldúa cultivated — a gaze that sees the wound and the possibility at once. A gaze that refuses to collapse complexity. A gaze that knows that my liberation is impossibly intertwined with yours.
This week, I am practicing doing nothing in Odell’s sense:
stepping outside the logics that demand constant performance,
letting myself rest in the cracks of the day,
choosing to notice the small things that stitch me back together.
Because attention — real attention — is how we rehearse for another world.
May you find a pocket of quiet today.
May you discover the sacred hum beneath the noise.
May your attention turn toward what feeds your becoming.
Paz y ternura,
Roberto+
Reflection Questions for the Week
1. Where is my attention being extracted, and where is it being nourished?
What habits, apps, relationships, or internal narratives consume my gaze without giving anything back?
2. What small thing did I notice today that invited me home to myself?
A sound, a scent, a temperature shift, a breath — what did my body register before my mind caught up?
3. How does my attention shape the relationships I am committed to repairing?
Where might a shift in presence open space for tenderness, honesty, or new possibility?
4. What is the pace of my healing right now?
Am I moving at a speed that honors my nervous system, my ancestors, and the living world that holds me?
5. Where am I being invited into a more fugitive way of dwelling?
What demands of empire can I refuse this week, even if the refusal is small?
6. Where can I practice Baldwin’s ethic of facing myself with love rather than judgment?
What truth — however subtle — is asking for my attention?
Field Guide for Noticing
A Weeklong Practice for a Slow Rebellion
1. The 60-Second Land Acknowledgment
Once a day, step outside (or stand by a window) and allow your body to sense the world without reaching for your phone.
Notice:
temperature
birdsong or its absence
wind direction
a color you haven’t seen in a while
Let this be your bioregional check-in — a way of returning to place, as Odell invites.
2. The Body Scan of Belonging
Pause for a moment and ask:
What is my body saying right now that I have been too busy to hear?
Notice tension without fixing it. Notice breath without optimizing it.
This is care as turning toward, not away.
3. The “One Beautiful Thing” Journal
Each evening, write down one small thing you noticed that made you feel more human:
the way sunlight spilled across the table,
the pattern of a leaf,
the softness of a cat’s purr.
This is how you train perception toward the life-giving.
4. The Communal Attention Exchange
Before the week ends, share with someone — by text, voice note, or kitchen-table conversation — something you noticed that surprised you.
Invite them to share something they noticed in return.
This weaves attention into community and turns noticing into solidarity.
5. The Digital Sabbath Micro-Refusal
Choose one sliver of the day — 10 minutes, or an hour, or your morning coffee — where you step outside the attention economy.
No scrolling.
No inbox.
Just presence.
Let this be your fugitive gesture for the week.
Benediction
Beloveds,
may your attention become a sanctuary this week—
a place where your breath can settle,
where your spirit can unfurl without demand or deadline.
May you refuse every story that tells you
your worth is measured in output,
in speed,
in constant availability.
May you cultivate a gaze that is slow enough
to notice the shimmer on a leaf,
the truth rising in your chest,
the holy insistence of your own becoming.
May you practice a small, radiant refusal
of empire’s noise,
so you can hear the quiet hum
of the world that still wants you,
that still welcomes you,
that still believes you belong.
And may your noticing—
however small,
however subtle—
become a seed of repair
for yourself,
for your community,
and for this trembling world
that is aching to be remade in love.
Go in peace,
go in tenderness,
go in attention.