Essential instructions, day I

Yesterday was the first day of a Miksang contemplative workshop by Hèlen A Vink in Zandvoort and it was all about the flash of perception. The full name of the workshop is: Essential instructions for looking and seeing. The first day was about understanding what stopped you and what the qualities of perception were.

The flashes appear in the gaps of our busy mind: in between moments that we are not thinking and when we are are available to the world around us. 

When our mind is quiet, a flash can appear out of nowhere, all of a sudden. It is shocking and disorienting. We are jolted from sleep into awake and we are uncertain as to what is happening, but we whatever we saw it is present and powerful.

We practiced to learn to trust our flash of perception yesterday by recognizing the following steps:

• there is a flash of perception
• you recognize the flash
• you acknowlegde that it is a flash
• you trust your flash
• you stabilize your experience
• you link yourself to your flash
• you express your flash by clicking the shutter button

The two biggest obstacles are: not trusting your flash and having a photographic ambition (wanting to make a pretty picture).

Looking is the proficient means and seeing is the aspect of wisdom. We look first and then we start to see.

After a couple of visual exercises our assignment was to see like a child and to take pictures like them. It was all about the flash: we had a flash, we acknowledged it, clicked, looked at it again and then walked away without looking on the camera how it turned out.

 It felt light and joyful. The pictures you see are the result of a wonderful day.