I did not intend that title as a command but perhaps it did get your attention. That seems to be harder and harder to do lately. Much is written every day about the enormous demands on our attention from modern life. Demands the pandemic has exacerbated. Some might think that appearing in court from your living room or meeting with a client from your dining table makes life simpler. Occasionally, perhaps? Not so much for parents when kids are at home. Even if you Zoom from your meditation room (we all have one of those, right?), how many apps have you had to install and learn? Do you remember just what to do on Microsoft Teams when you last used it two months ago because the only court you appear in that uses it is L.A.? And the court’s website insists in one place that you use the app and in another that the browser will give you the optimal experience? But hey, if you’re not traveling to court, you have more time to work!

The pandemic has forced us to learn all sorts of new ways to do much of what we do. Suddenly. That has demanded much of our attention. And we only have so much. It feels to me like everything is taking longer to get done—and more isn’t getting done at all. I’ve noticed that it is harder to get people’s attention generally—including mine. Email replies are slower and sometimes they don’t arrive (or leave) at all. Things are not done when promised (okay, not exactly a new issue but it sure seems worse to me, including when I’m doing the promising.)

Our attention is becoming so fragmented that it is harder to simply think. For lawyers, that’s a problem. I decided to write about this topic after reading an excellent article in The Guardian by Johann Hari with the apt title, “Your attention didn’t collapse. It was stolen.” Stolen by emails. Texts. Devices. The web. Many of us try to adapt by becoming better multi-taskers, but Hari makes clear that the “switch-cost effect” will prevent that: our ability to multi-task is limited and what we are really doing is rapidly switching our attention, which comes with the high price of having to refocus with every switch. Students taking a test did 20% worse when they received text messages during the test.

Some of the solution can come only from collective action. A war for our attention has been going on for quite some time and we have been taking action but not nearly enough. I would not exactly declare victory in the battle between robocallers and everyone else. I’ll leave legislative battles up to others for now and stick closer to home. Can MCBA help? Or at least not make things worse? MCBA is a mutual-benefit organization after all. As we continue to navigate what life looks like living with COVID-19, what do you want to see from MCBA? I think past presidents Sue Feder and Tim Nardell and of course our Executive Director Mee Mee Wong did a fabulous job working with our board to lead MCBA through radical changes, keeping our legal community vibrant and bringing much-needed help to our entire community. Not everything will return to the way it was before the pandemic. Much of that will be a good thing. But it may be just as challenging charting a course as—we hope—the pandemic recedes. What course would you chart? I’d like to hear what you’d like from MCBA so that it is best serving your needs.

Of course, some of the solution to preserving our ability to focus will come from what each of us does for ourselves. Johann Hari experimented with an entire summer electronically disconnected, a luxury most of us can’t afford. Our loyal readers (and probably even some of our not so loyal readers) know that I am a meditation teacher and meditation is all about attention. Literally. It is about paying attention in a way so that you can make more conscious choices. While the kind of meditation I practice offers a great respite during practice (it is based on something called “sleep of the yogi” after all), ultimately, meditation is a tool. A tool for training attention and making better choices. Of course, you don’t have to meditate to make better choices. I remember when Apple added the notification feature to Macs and I thought, “Great, I don’t have to check my email all the time, I can see when an important email comes in.” I now keep notifications turned off (that whole “switch-cost effect” thing). Choices like this can be tough to make. If everyone else is connected all the time, expectations rise. I urge everyone to resist constant connection (yes, I need plenty of practice at that too), since we don’t have the benefit of France’s “right to disconnect” law, prohibiting employers from requiring 24/7 availability.

As much of a problem as not being able to really think deeply could be for lawyers, I’ve found being a lawyer itself helps cultivate attention. As chaotic as any given day might be, with constant phone calls and meetings and emails, a lot of my work requires deep thinking or at least deep concentration. I couldn’t get my work done without taking blocs of time to do what I sometimes call my “actual work.” And mediating (an entirely different thing from meditating) is always a tremendous act of concentration. As much as our modern lifestyle may chip away at our attention, I count myself lucky that much of my work itself is practice resisting the onslaught of distractions. But I’d say we still need all the help we can get with our attention. What do you do to help focus? Do you communicate with clients via text? Can you resist the siren song of a new client voicemail while you are writing a motion? Enquiring minds want to know. Share with me what techniques you use for eliminating distractions and keeping your attention where you’d like it to be. I hope that just bringing attention in this message to your attention helps you be a little more conscious this month of where you spend that precious resource.

Discovery Facilitators. Now turning our attention to less abstract concerns, the Marin Court needs more discovery facilitators. Urgently! Judge Sweet has asked for our help to get more volunteers for the Court’s long-running discovery facilitator program. Most of you probably know that a facilitator volunteers up to two hours of time to resolve a discovery dispute. If more time is needed, the parties can decide whether to continue to work with you for compensation. You can find the application to volunteer on the Court’s website. For more information or to return your completed application, contact Elizabeth Turner, the Court’s ADR coordinator at adr@marin.courts.ca.gov or 415.444.7049 (press 2 to skip message).