What to focus on

In my meditation today I found difficulty in remaining focused on anything in particular. Instead, my thoughts wondered to nothing really. It just didn't obey what I considered were the commands it should. Later as I ran, I found the same problem arising. I could not maintain focus on my breathing cycles. Naturally, this bothered me. However, in reflection I find that I was again falling into the trap of forcing the experience and in so doing missing the point. Once the mind is distracted with the compulsive notion that it has to control something, the moment is lost. Presence is lost. Contact with the current reality is lost. To gain unforced union with something more is the goal of contemplative practice. Trying to get it misses the point and leads into a trap. The illusion of effort. It takes effort to undertake the practice, but the practice itself, must not rely on effort. If it does, the mind will analyze and become paralyzed by this analysis. Instead, seek to us the heart, the lower neurons, the older parts of the brain. These tend not to be given to too much over-thought. When the relaxation becomes natural, the proper state has been reached. But don't focus on it. In looking back I find that I was in that state all along as I resolved to surrender to the waves of thought and let them pass over me. In all things let the waves pass over. Only you will remain.