"If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would
appear as it is, infinite."
____ William Blake, "A Memorable Fancy"
The doors of perception are the senses - not only the physical senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch, but also the subtle senses of inner vision, resonance, instinct, discrimination, and empathy. Without the cooperation of these two sets of senses, we cannot perceive truly.
To be able to perceive everything as it really is means retraining and exercising senses that we have often neglected. Meditation can hone our subtle senses, as we reach beyond the physical for the unseen reality and its meaning. Using a range of senses, we rely on our tactile, and emphathetic senses to combine with our hearing and resonance so that, like a bat or a whale, we have a sense of space, distance and mass. Or we may find that our sense of smell/taste combines with our instinct and discrimination to give our visual field a sense of color and quality that is both accurate and surprising.
When the doors of perception are cleansed, we receive earlier warning of matters that are likely to be dangerous or problematic for us; we are subsequently able to make better decisions, draft more accurate forecasts, and read the character of the universe in an altogether better way.
"Practice using your subtle senses in combination with your physical senses today. Your eyes tell you one thing about a person, but what do your ears tell you? Is the message different? What do your deep instinct and discrimination have to say?"
[From: "The Celtic Spirit" by Caitlin Matthews]
No comments:
Post a Comment