Sight is a very powerful sense.
We are looking almost all of the time,
But we rarely look deeply.
We miss so much of our world and training the sense of sight can bring a great connection and appreciation to all the beauty we would otherwise miss.
You can do this practice anywhere,
Out in nature,
Your garden,
A park,
Or you can use a house plant or a flower.
Sit facing a plant.
Pause this if you're not near one now.
So seated in a relaxed posture,
You're about to connect with this living being,
Allowing your posture to be bright,
Wakeful and fully alive,
Dropping any tension.
Relax.
Drop your awareness into your abdomen and feel a gentle rise and fall of the belly.
Try to remain with breathing sensations,
Adding the words in your mind,
Rising with the in-breath,
And falling with the out-breath.
Rising.
Falling.
Trying to remain with this gentle expansion and contraction.
Rising.
Falling.
Now look at the plant or flower,
Really engage with it,
Trying to connect with its aliveness.
Really trying to see something that you haven't seen before.
The colour change of the veins on the petals.
The myriad shades of colour.
A petal isn't just red,
Is it?
A leaf isn't just green.
Try to feel the life inside of it,
Its essence,
Its beauty.
Try to get in touch with it,
To feel it responding to you.
Can you feel how rooted in being it is?
Take in its teaching of radiant stillness,
Its effortless beauty.
Let all of this occur naturally.
Don't think about it,
Just absorb it.
See it like it's the first time you have ever seen a flower,
Or a leaf,
Or whatever you have chosen.
And when your mind wanders away into thinking,
Just bring your attention back to seeing,
To seeing in a raw way.
Reconnecting over and over.
Only seeing.
Now release the practice.
Staying relaxed,
What did you learn?
Now try to look at the world the same way as you go about your day.
Even if you're moving through a busy city,
Be mindful of what you're seeing.
If you can,
Stop,
Even for five seconds,
And really see.
See without old labels.
Let what your eyes see be the subject for today.
Stop,
Pause and really see.
We live in absolute beauty.
Heaven is here on earth,
But we miss it.
We go about our lives seeing what's inside of our head,
An old rehashed version of reality.
We're so full of preconceived ideas,
And that's why life feels really dull.
The lazy brain is boxing away the raw freshness of life as if it's seen it all before.
Do you remember how bright and beautiful the world was when you were a child?
Think back.
That's because your mind was much emptier.
You saw a clearer vision of reality.
See the glory of the world in which you live with brand new eyes and an empty mind.
