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- (continued) hand. Continue this exercise five times at a sitting, and then increase it to ten times.
This exercise will make you "tired," but you must persevere as it is of importance to you in the directions of training your attention by directing it to trivial and monotonous exercises; in addition, it will give you direct control over all of your muscular movements. You soon will feel the benefit accruing from these simple and apparently unimportant exercises. Do not fail to keep the attention closely upon the closing and unclosing of the fingers. That is the main point, if you neglect it; you lose the entire benefit of the exercise.
- This exercise is nothing more or less than the old trick, often observed among our country cousins, known as "twirling the thumbs." Place the fingers of one hand, leaving the thumbs free. Then slowly twirl the thumbs one over the other, with a circular motion. Be sure to keep the attention firmly fixed upon the ends of the thumbs.
- Place the right hand on the knee, the fingers and thumb closed, with the exception of the first finger, which must be pointed out in front of you. Then move the finger slowly from side to side, keeping the attention firmly fixed upon the end of the finger.
These exercises may be extended indefinitely, and you may exercise your ingenuity in supplying additional one under this head. The main idea is that the exercise shall consist of some trivial, familiar, momentous muscular movement, and that the attention must be kept firmly fixed upon the moving part of the body. Your attention will revolt at the slavery enforced upon it, and will endeavor in every possible way to escape its thralldom. This is where the training comes in, and you must insist that your attention does its work, from beginning to end, and not wander away to more congenial scenes or occupations. Think of yourself as a strict schoolmaster, and of your attention as a playful, fun loving boy who tires of looking at his book and wishes to steal sly glances out of the window and door at the more attractive sights on the outside. Your business is to keep the boy at his
