Okay, let's assume you get lost 40 times in one hour. That's a busy mind. 40 times in one hour. You're on the breath or whatever your subject is, you get lost, you note it, you come back, you get lost, you note it, you come back. Now if you're busy 40 times in one hour, a lot of people don't like that meditation. It wasn't peaceful. They're upset, like this person - "Ahh, not again!" You have 40 chances during that hour to get angry, or you have 40 chances in that hour to note the reality of the moment, understand your mind is busy, and gently come back again.
What qualities are you developing if you just note it gently and return? Think about it. You're developing Patience, obviously. You're developing Compassion for yourself. You're not making yourself upset. You're having more Equanimity towards your wandering mind. If you're actually noting it objectively, you actually see it clearly, and that's more Wisdom. You're going to find some more good qualities that are being developed every time you note and come back. If you note gently and come back 80 times in one hour - wow! - you have 80 chances of doing good work instead of 80 chances of getting angry at yourself.
You have to reflect in this way; you actually have to reflect that a busy mind is not necessarily any problem here. How you react to the busy mind, that's where the problem may arise or may not arise. When you hear us talking about reaction, which we start talking about on the first night of every retreat (and the word is in almost every single talk, along with Compassion), we relate the two. Having Compassion for our difficulties means we have to be wiser in our reactions to life. So the more you can actually tell yourself, "Hey, by noting and coming back, I'm doing good work. I don't have to be concentrated all the time to do good work," the wiser your reaction will be.
A good thief is very concentrated. They haven't been caught for 15 years and have been robbing all sorts of buildings, banks, homes, and other places. Their concentration is super; better than anybody here, I guarantee it 99%. They're going to have better concentration than people here, but they have wrong view; they have wrong understanding; they're not compassionate to the people, they're robbing and they're not compassionate to themselves and to others.
A busy mind is just a busy mind. That's all it is. It's just a busy mind. Can you be aware of the busy mind? Sometimes the mind will be more settled. Many times it will not be settled; it will be busy. But your job is not to say, "Busy mind is terrible, calm mind is great." We don't teach that. If you can be aware of the busy mind 40 times, note it calmly and come back, that's a better sit then somebody who sits there, stays concentrated for 40 minutes, and then gets angry when somebody next to them starts coughing, thinking, "They should leave the hall. They are making too much noise. They're bothering me."
That one time of that person getting angry after 40 minutes of staying calm means they are not learning anything here. But with a person who's busy 40 times, notes it, comes back, notes it, comes back; when the person next to them starts coughing, they note "hearing, hearing," they come back, maybe they give a Compassion/Lovingkindness wish to the person, they come back. That's a nice practice as far as we're concerned. So when you're thinking, "Oh no, I'm lost again," change that around. Did you note gently? Did you come back easily? Did you develop Wisdom, Patience, Equanimity and other things? If you did, pat yourself on the back; you did it right.