Could someone please advise me how I can focus on the tip of my nose while meditating?
Whenever I try I just go crosseyed or can just see one side of my nose or the other and not the tip! Am I actually supposed to be crosseyed while doing it?
Many thanks.
Focusing on the tip of the nose doesn’t necessarily mean focusing the eyes there. I think you want to pay more attention to the movement of air as you breathe. Drink it in like nectar. The eyes can focus generally in the area directly in front of you, without looking around or off into the distance. These aren’t hard and fast rules. The idea is that by focusing your senses in a single place you also focus your mind in a single place. Every time that you shift your vision or your attention, that’s a modification of citta.
I agreed to previous post that you just need to keep attention due to breathing. It is the best strategy to focusing. Though doing meditation in a peaceful place will be more benefit to focusing.
I differ with the earlier posts. Practices like these are very meticulously designed and rules of a perfect practice are hard and fast. However, the approach, how to reach the perfect state, is different. One has to slowly and gently evolve to perfection. So, on the way, teachers advice little relaxation here or there, which does not mean that the practice is less precise or rigorous. The rigor of Yoga is in patience, in steadfast devotion and rising through the rungs of diluted efforts to a perfect state.
First, focusing on certain parts of the body (nose in this case) itself is a result of mind’s energy, not the other way around. Senses are working anyways, what one has to consciously do is to become aware of it. Hence, moving the mind’s attention there.
Secondly, looking cross-eyed (however, not forcing it) is required, natural and intended. Eyes are lenses hardwired to certain areas of the brain for the signal-procesing. That little strain on the eyes rejuvenates the whole sensing process.
Thirdly, the real intention is to build ability of sensing subtle things. So, by providing energy to the highly sensitive nerve centers in the tip of the nose, one needs to learn sensing the subtle air moving in and out. The otherwise ignored aspects like warmth, humidity, volume, direction, rate and consistency of flow of air needs to become alive.
Lastly, when this is done so comfortably that there is no strain, one would intuitively sense the chakras like sahasrara, bindu and ajna. And that is the real goal.
Secondly, looking cross-eyed (however, not forcing it) is required, natural and intended.
??? … I don’t think so.
So there you have it - two different opinions. Now it is up to you to decide what works best for you.
So which do you prefer, to drink in the air like nectar or to sit and look cross-eyed at your nose?
It is natural for a beginner’s to experienced eyes going crossways/or able to see one side of tip of nose or other of it. It is also fact that regular practice of the technique do help to attain purpose of such a concentration over a period of time. Do take the following steps of practicing concentration meditation for 40 days as.
Preparation:
Asuri,
Your first post at 10:20 was matter-of-fact, perhaps spontaneous.
Second post at 12:18 was a rhetoric, with an intention to ridicule what is inconsistent with what you ‘think’. That’s what intellect does.
Yes, when the two choices are placed in the proper perspective it does seem ridiculous that one should be required to sit and look cross-eyed at the nose. What the intellect does is postulate some sort of benefit for the ridiculous.
Second post at 12:18 was a rhetoric, with an intention to ridicule what is inconsistent with what you ‘think’. That’s what intellect does.
Nothing, changed there then 
I agree with Suhas, the cross-eyed nose gazing is a natural result of what happens if you focus on the tip of the nose, following the breath entering and leaving the nostrils. This is a very popular technique of meditation in Buddhism. When you will focus on the tip of your nose, your attention will go there, and you will find automatically your gaze will go there as well. Otherwise, you are going to find it is confusing when your gaze is somewhere else, say in between your eyebrows and your attention is at the tip of your nose.
If you are mediating on the tip of your nose following the natural breath, the best place to direct your gaze is at the tip. If you are meditating on the third eye center(in between the eye brows) then your gaze should be looking up and inwards just a little above and in between the eye brows(known as Shambhava mudra)
There is a special kind of pramayana technique known as chakra breathing, where one breathes into and out from the chakra they are focusing on, here the gaze is on that chakra. So if you are focusing on the solar plexus chakra, your gaze will be cast downwards(also known as navel-gazing) and you will direct your breath in and out of that chakra.
So don’t worry if your eyes go cross-eyed while doing the nose tip technique 
Could we please have a discussion that is focused on the benefit of the original poster and not a battle of egos.
It is a question of technique for a particular practice, which is only one of many practices. We know that there are other practices that advocate gazing on distant objects so nothing about this particular practice is a hard and fast rule that must always be followed.
As to technique - from my experience, I believe the correct instruction for this practice is to focus the [I][B]attention[/B][/I] on the tip of the nose. There is no requirement that the eyes be focused there, especially if it is a distraction to you. It’s perfectly acceptable for the eyes to be looking close in front of you, usually downward at the floor in front of you as you sit. The focus of attention should be on what is happening at the tip of the nose, which will be the movement of air in and out of the nostrils as you breathe. You may find that as you focus attention on the movement of air, attention is withdrawn from the field of vision and it becomes irrelevant. It’s helpful to think of the air as being like nectar as you breathe in.
Could we please have a discussion that is focused on the benefit of the original poster and not a battle of egos.
The only ego that seems to be bruised here is yours. Again, as in all threads, you start the conflicts when something does not sit well with you by ridiculing and attacking the viewpoint and/or the poster, and then later complain why the conflict started in the first place. Again in this thread it is you who starts it with post # 6, the continue it with post # 9. Some would consider this trolling.
Nasikagra Drishti has a wonderful benefit of strengthening the muscles of the eyes. It also helps with focus. The eyes do cross as they gaze at the tip of the nose, which is how the muscles strengthen. It is natural to see one side of the nose as we usually have a dominant eye. It has definite therapeutic applications.
As a preliminary practice try extending one arm out in front of you. Make a fist and extend the thumb up toward ceiling. Focus both eyes on the thumb as you bend the arm to bring the thumb to the tip of the nose. Breathe in as you bring the thumb to the nose and out as you release it back. You can also try alternating between a couple seconds of nose tip gazing and then gazing on a distant object. Be patient, it takes practice. Palming is also quite effective before practicing nose tip gazing. Generate heat by rubbing your palms together then gently placing them over closed eyes. Hold there until heat is lost. Repeat several times. This relaxes the muscles and increases circulation of the aqueous humor. Very calming.
Nasikagra Drishti does not have to “this or that”. Breathing and awareness are a part of it.
And @ Asuri,
In my training and from my library of books the awareness is only on the tip of the nose. They will naturally cross. The idea is to focus only your awareness on the tip of the nose. Nothing else. The idea is introspection.
So which do you prefer, to drink in the air like nectar or to sit and look cross-eyed at your nose?
Thank you for your replies.
I am inclined to stick with the hard and fast rules of the practice, following correct procedures. I’ll therefore continue as I am doing, focusing on the tip, and now I won’t worry about going crosseyed.
Thank you so much for all the extra information and advice, it’s a great help.
Hello,
There is a passage in Autobiography of a Yogi where Yogananda relates what his guru Sri Yukteswar said about this:
‘Master enlarged my understanding not only of astrology but of the world’s scriptures. Placing the holy texts on the spotless table of his mind, he was able to dissect them with the scalpel of intuitive reasoning, and to separate errors and interpolations of scholars from the truths as originally expressed by the prophets.
“Fix one’s vision on the end of the nose.” This inaccurate interpretation of a Bhagavad Gita stanza, widely accepted by Eastern pundits and Western translators, used to arouse Master’s droll criticism.
“The path of a yogi is singular enough as it is,” he remarked. “Why counsel him that he must also make himself cross-eyed? The true meaning of nasikagram is 'origin of the nose, not ‘end of the nose.’ The nose begins at the point between the two eyebrows, the seat of spiritual vision.”’
If this is correct you would be mentally focusing on it, not with your actual eyes. Using your Third Eye to focus on your Third Eye.
Namaste.
AS
[QUOTE=yoganewgirl;71868]Thank you for your replies.
I am inclined to stick with the hard and fast rules of the practice, following correct procedures. I’ll therefore continue as I am doing, focusing on the tip, and now I won’t worry about going crosseyed.
Thank you so much for all the extra information and advice, it’s a great help.[/QUOTE]
I have actually been struggling with the same thing for a while, especially during my Ashtanga yoga practice where in certain asanas the gaze is at the tip of the nose. I find that looking completely crosseyed in order to get the tip off my nose in full focus can make me quite dizzy, but I find a sort of ‘middle point’ where I look down towards the tip of my nose without crossing my eyes so far that I get the tip in full focus. This may sound a bit vague but I sort off see the tip of my nose twice and then focus where the image crosses. This actually really helps me with keeping my attention inwards and after I found this method in which I don’t get dizzy it has had a surprising effect on my asana practice, simply because of the added focus. So definitely worth trying I would say 
[QUOTE=Suhas Tambe;71805]
Secondly, looking cross-eyed (however, not forcing it) is required, natural and intended. Eyes are lenses hardwired to certain areas of the brain for the signal-procesing. That little strain on the eyes rejuvenates the whole sensing process.
[/QUOTE]
I don’t feel like crossing my eyes is natural, I’d much rather focus on my breathing - but to each his own.
I\ve never actually thought of focusing the attention on the tip of the nose. Loking forward to trying it out =D