How to reduce distractions in sitting practice?

1st you have to recognise the main source of distraction is within.

You have to practice the following:

• recognise that the mind wondered away
• there always some delight or sensation associated with the object. E.g. your phone. Recognise this and stay with it until it disappear.
• this will have rippling or other associated sensation in our whole body due to though proliferation or sustained thought. Recognise this and bring your attention to the chosen object

With practise your inclination for delight in external objects will diminish. Also have a strong determination that you will meditate for x time every day. As you go on increase the time actually spent without distraction to be in line with what you want it to be.

While on the surface there are more distractions in today's day and age than any other before, there are in fact not any more distractions than there have ever been.

While it would appear that what pulls you away from meditation is working, internet social media pages, and other things like that, these are not what pull you away. What will always pull you away, and what has always pulled any human away is the stream of incessant chatter that you hear when you sit down and close your eyes.

There is nothing in the external world that is capable of causing distraction by itself. There are stories of Zen Monks who did not stir from Zazen as an earthquake struck. Distractions happen internally; not externally.

I'm going to limit the scope of my answer to a specific kind of meditation - the kind of meditation where you sit and focus - but for the record, meditation is in no way limited to that one definition. Meditation is available always; independent of circumstances.

For now, what would be powerful, I think, is if you really tell the truth to yourself about some things.

First - I don't know anything about your circumstances; but I'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest that time is not the issue. If you really confront how many hours you have in a day, and what it is that you are doing during each of those hours; I would be shocked if there were not 20 minutes you could claim for uninterrupted meditation time.

Most people live their lives in a haze of abstractions and stories about reality. Few people live their lives grounded in reality. In reality, you can only ever do the thing you are doing when you are doing it; and whatever that thing is doesn't take a long time or a short time - it takes some specific relatively predictable amount of time.

In our stories, "I have too much to do", "I never have enough time" , etc. In reality, quoting Werner Erhard:

The only thing you are going to do today is: what you do today. Therefore, the only thing there is to do today is: what you do today. That’s all there was to do when you started no matter what you thought or think.

So, there is time for meditation. There are no distractions that you deal with that are bigger than the distractions the millions of people who meditate deal with. What it takes to meditate is to be willing to listen to the chatter in your head and to see it for what it is.

It is not you! It is just noise. There is nothing that happens in your mind that requires immediate action. All there is to do when meditating is to give space to the noise; to observe the noise without becoming the noise. Thoughts are just that; thoughts.

What you will also find is that the moment you sit to meditate, your mind is suddenly a buzz with things you have to do. You will notice yourself becoming overwhelmed with concerns about incomplete projects, promises un-kept, dreams unfulfilled, things you have to do today, etc. All there is to do is to let the thoughts be...and eventually...they will let you be.

How are people supposed to practice sitting meditation when there are so many distractions around like working, internet social media pages and other things like that?

1.You can try to make the time to do sitting meditation.Even if it's just for 5 minutes.Put it down in your organizer or calender. Hopefully this will give you the motivation to do it.

2.Practice working meditation,social media meditation,and other things like that meditation.What i mean is practice being aware of what you are doing.If you are working be aware of working.If your on social media be aware of being on social media.Whatever you do just be aware of it.Nothing is beyond awareness.You can be aware of anything from the greatest happiness to the most torturing pain.

Basically what you need is Right Effort.