If you find yourself suffering from sensory overload and find it difficult to get yourself in a peaceful and tranquil spot then you need a specific type of meditation for your distracted mind. When you try and meditate normally your thoughts can be pulled off message if you are too distracted. Smells, sounds and lights can pull you off focusing on your breath and your meditation.
This meditation for concentrating on breath and a distracted mind should be done, if possible, for ten minutes every evening and morning. Before you commence the meditation, make sure you get your meditating space as quiet and silent and as comfortable as you possibly can. Look around for any distractions that have the slightest chance of causing you problems and then remove them.
Firstly, sit yourself down cross-legged on your cushions and set your bottom slightly raised. If you are unable to sit cross-legged, then sit on a chair. Make sure your back is straight, and that your shoulders are level and relaxed and then concentrate on keeping your chin parallel with the floor. Next, lower your eyes down and try to focus about a meter (approximately 3 feet) in front of you. Put your hands on your keens gently.
Secondly, start to try and breathe normally through your nose – to do this you need to use your abdomen as opposed to using your chest. Check out the posture of your body and then relax any of your body parts which may be feeling tense.
Next, try counting your breath on each exhalation and then when you get to ten, start all over again. Notice if you feel that you are distracted by anything external, which could be the sound of an engine of a car starting, or the smell of something cooking in the kitchen or next door, or even small changes in the temperature or light or the taste of toothpaste in your mouth. Label the distraction and return to concentrating on focusing on your breath.
Finally, try and keep track of any distractions you encounter in the course of a week. See if your reaction to external distractions is different from your internal thought distractions. See if your irritation begins to lessen over the next few weeks.