Reflection 20

Welcome!


The Still Pool

Each thing has a boundary round it. It’s surrounded by other things. My keyboard is surrounded by my desk, my desk by the room… But the room, the whole field of vision, the world as it is presented to me, has no boundary – it fades out into nothing, is surrounded by nothing. It hangs there, or rather here, in nothingness, in awake space. Do you find the same?

Sometimes in a workshop I ask people to hold their hands out in front of them, and then slowly bring their hands back towards and past their heads – and notice what happens to their hands. Mine disappear into the void, into my Single Eye. Where do yours go? (Don’t guess, do it!)

When you do this you are guiding your attention from there to here – your attention travels with your hands from in front of you all the way home to the clearness here.

A friend of mine, Colin, visited Douglas Harding at his home many years ago to find out about this method of Self-Realization. The moment the penny dropped for Colin was when he explored with his hands the place he was looking out of. Here’s a poem he wrote:


Light

The interior light
is nothing but light;
light upon light.

It is a still pool.
Fingers that try to touch
will, without a ripple, disappear.

The interior light
is the clear light of being.
The light on the rock.

Close to, the eye
may catch the swing
of the lamp of amazement,

but the light itself
is nothing but light;
light upon light.

Colin Oliver (from Stepping Into Brilliant Air)


Dip your hands now into the still pool and notice - no ripples!


In his article, A True Beginning, you can find out more about how Colin Oliver discovered Seeing. You can also read more of Colin’s poems on the website.

Warm regards from the still pool!


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