This round of Intermediate level of instruction in meditation sets out from the premise that our collective perception of duality and ourselves as dual can be used to establish the more true and refined awareness of One and, thus, oneness.
Duality is experienced as perception, concepts, ideas, desires, and the experience of having an experience of any kind. We can “have” an experience because of the primary perception of oneself and everything else as other than oneself. Yet, is that actually correct?
It is not my role as a meditation teacher to say yes or no to that (duality again), but instead to offer to the practitioner a way to explore one’s experience such that there can be room for such a question.
The gaze is one way to explore perceptions. The idea is similar to tessellated imagery. As one gazes, distinction changes thus perception changes. One’s mind then stops looking for the distinctness of the parts of the experience (or image) and settles into the spaciousness and oneness of the experience itself. This experience is conveyed by the word “mandala” in Tibetan Buddhism.
* After the instruction, this is mostly a silent meditation. It is to your benefit to have the image at eye level, or at least, not in a downward location. The head tilted down is not conducive to meditation or attention. That position engenders sleep or dullness.
Downloadable podcast: Using duality 2: the gaze
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