The great obstacle to the proper use of the Will, in the case of the majority of people, is the lack of ability to focus the attention.  The Yogis clearly understand this point, and many of the Raja Yoga exercises which are given to the students by the teachers, are designed to overcome this difficulty.  Attention is the outward evidence of the Will.  As a French writer has said:  “The attention is subject to the superior authority of the Ego.  I yield it, or I withhold it, as I please.  I direct it in turn to several points.  I concentrate it upon each point as long as my Will can stand the effort.”  Prof.  James has said:  “The essential achievement of the Will, when it is most voluntary, is to attend to a difficult object, and hold it fast before the mind.  Effort of Attention is the essential phenomenon of the Will.”  And Prof.  Halleck says:  “The first step toward the development of Will lies in the exercise of Attention.  Ideas grow in distinctness and motor-power as we attend to them.  If we take two ideas of the same intensity and center the attention upon one, we shall notice how much it grows in power.”  Prof.  Sully says:  “Attention may be roughly defined as the active self-direction of the mind to any object which presents itself at the moment.”  The word “Attention” is derived from two Latin words, ad tendere, meaning “to stretch towards,” and this is just what the Yogis know it to be.  By means of their psychic or clairvoyant sight, they see the thought of the attentive person stretched out toward the object attended to, like a sharp wedge, the point of which is focused upon the object under consideration, the entire force of the thought being concentrated at that point.  This is true not only when the person is considering an object, but when he is earnestly impressing his ideas upon another, or upon some task to be accomplished.  Attention means reaching the mind out to and focusing it upon something.

The trained Will exhibits itself in a tenacious Attention, and this Attention is one of the signs of the trained Will.  The student must not hastily conclude that this kind of Attention is a common faculty among men.  On the contrary it is quite rare, and is seen only among those of “strong” mentality.  Anyone may fasten his Attention upon some passing, pleasing thing, but it takes a trained will to fasten it upon some unattractive thing, and hold it there.  Of course the trained occultist is able to throw interest into the most unattractive thing upon which it becomes advisable to focus his Attention, but this, in itself, comes with the trained Will, and is not the possession of the average man.  Voluntary Attention is rare, and is found only among strong characters.  But it may be cultivated and grown, until he who has scarcely a shade of it to-day, in time may become a giant.  It is all a matter of practice, exercise, and Will.