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You have what is called "Monkey Mind". It is where your mind just bounces all over the place and refuses to settle down. Of course the harder you try, the worse it gets. It is like trying to get a 2 year old to sit quietly in the middle of a tantrum. The more upset you get the worse the situation gets. Thats the bad news. The good news is that just about everyone has it, and there is a way to stop it.

The secret is to stop trying. If your mind wanders, just watch it go. When you become aware that it has wandered, gently bring it back if even for a second. When it wanders off again (and it will), do the same. You may spend only a few seconds in "mindfulness" during a 30 minute meditation in the beginning, but that IS meditation. Don't think that meditation is where you sit down and just bliss out or go into a deep trance. Meditation is the discipline of doing what I outlined above. Most people have the expectation that they should be able to sit still for 30 minutes and just go right into a trance or a deep peaceful place. Maybe after 10 years of daily practice can you expect to do that, but even then it is somewhat rare. In the beginning meditation is a discipline of taming the Monkey Mind.

Most people, especially in the West, really have no control over their minds. It is little wonder the world is in the state it is in. In the West we practice gaining control over our environment (which we are masters at), but our minds we just let terrorize our inner (and outer) peace. Even if we where able to get our external environment to be perfect, our out-of-control minds will find something wrong. Something to go to war over, someone else to blame for our unhappiness.

Off my soap box now. Thank you.

Meditation is hard precisely because it is so simple. We have been programmed that we must be doing something, trying to achieve something, moving towards some worthy goal. When we arent doing these things we get restless and board. To sit and do nothing in particular seems like a waste of time to most of us.

Meditation is not really about achieving enlightenment, or relaxation or even to clear our minds of all thoughts. Meditation is a practice of taking a little time each day to simply sit still and witness. Witness our thoughts, our inner chatter, the sounds of the traffic, the smells in the air. We are so out of touch with this that it seems totally foreign and alien. We think we must meditate for a reason. People may have talked about having great spiritual experiences during meditation, or great philosophical insights, or even just simple relaxation. All of these things can and do happen to people, but if that is your goal, then you are starting in the wrong place right off the bat.

For many people fishing is meditation, for others doing laundry is meditation. Ive had my deepest senses of meditation while building things. I become so totally in the moment, and so totally involved in the process, that I loose myself. I loose all sense of time and just flow with process. While doing it, I was not aware that this was going on since I was so involved. If would have become aware of this, I doubt that state of consciousness could have continued since my awareness would have shifted from being totally in process to thinking Gee isnt this cool, Ive totally become lost in this process which isnt the same thing.

You cant think your way into meditation, but you do need your thinking mind to put you on the path in the first place.

If you struggle with sitting meditation try taking a quiet walk alone in nature, or do the things that you most love to do in the world, where you feel you can be totally yourself and express yourself. Meditation might just slip under your awareness and afterward you might just think, Gee, that was sure cool. I lost all track of myself, time, my problems, the world situation, etc.

I personally find sitting meditation challenging for the same reasons you are expressing Gill. Ive done my share, and had some good from it. But I try my best to practice mindfulness in doing things. That way it takes the pressure off and it satisfies that conditioning that most of us have that we need to be doing something. But Ive found that in doing something that I really love, I stop doing it and just become it. Not something you can necessarily tell the difference of from watching from the outside, but my inner experience is profoundly different.

I hope this helps you. I responded to your question because I felt I could sure relate to your problems. Thanks for letting me express myself.