Let’s say you are in a dark room with a flashlight.
You direct the flashlight at stuff in the room.
The things in the dark room are sights, sounds, thoughts.
We could call the flashlight “attention”.
We could call the act of directing the flashlight “paying attention” or “directing attention”.
And we can focus the light, make it tight and bright. Concentrate it.
We could also spread it out wide.
But the light itself? I dunno. Is it a magic ray?
Then again, reducing reality to an array of sensations like this is a significant step away from the conventional narrative anyway. Terminology gets screwy.
Let’s say you are in a dark room with a flashlight.
You direct the flashlight at stuff in the room.
The things in the dark room are sights, sounds, thoughts.
We could call the flashlight “attention”.
We could call the act of directing the flashlight “paying attention” or “directing attention”.
And we can focus the light, make it tight and bright. Concentrate it.
We could also spread it out wide.
But the light itself? I dunno. Is it a magic ray?
Then again, reducing reality to an array of sensations like this is a significant step away from the conventional narrative anyway. Terminology gets screwy.