Come into an upright,
Relaxed position.
I'll ask you to keep your eyes just gently open,
Gazing vacantly at a point in front of you,
Allowing the body to settle and giving whatever time you need for things that are stirred up in the mind to settle as well.
Having stabilized the mind a bit more,
Bring your attention to your visual field.
Recalling the profound teaching of the Buddha to Bahiya.
In the scene,
Let there be just the scene,
Allowing a naked attention,
Not projecting concepts and labels onto what arises within your visual field.
Just observe what is presented.
Just bare seeing.
Simply appearances arising within the space of vision.
Now close the eyes.
Gently turn your attention to the auditory field.
And again,
Continuing with the teaching of the Buddha,
In the herd,
Let there be only the herd,
Without any elaborations,
Without any labels or concepts.
These sounds are simply arising within the space of your awareness,
Recognizing that there are no boundaries,
No inside,
No outside,
And no owner of these sounds.
Shifting your attention now to the field of your body and the tactile sensations that are arising there.
You can notice the weight of the body,
The solidity,
The tingling sensations and vibrations,
Whatever they may be,
So that in the sensed,
Let there be only the sensed.
Noticing how these felt sensations are simply appearances arising within the space of awareness.
No real inside,
No outside,
No boundaries,
And no one causing them to arise.
Now gently shifting your mindfulness to the space of the mind itself.
Noticing whatever arises within that space,
The thoughts,
Imaginations,
Memories.
Simply just watch all of this play as you would watch a movie.
In the cognized,
Let there be only the cognized.
No grasping,
No identification to whatever arises within the space of the mind,
And no independent entity that is thinking these thoughts.
So through these stages,
This process,
Encompassing all of what the Buddha taught to Bahiya,
And when one sees that clearly,
One sees reality.
And it's only when we go out to label,
To judge,
To conceptualize,
To like or dislike,
That we can track into a separate self of a me in here and a thing out there.
But in realizing the no-thing nature of all that arises and ceases,
There's a relaxation,
A letting go,
And a liberation.
