Observed Meditations (Solo Flashback)

by **Anselm** on June 24th, 2012, 3:20 am

Observed Meditations
The 40th of Spring, 225 AV
Master Ahn's Dojo, Somewhere in the Zastoska Mountains

Anselm practiced mantric meditation through the Winter 225. He learned to center and silence the mind, to shut down the “noise” that normally fills most peoples' heads, to arrive at a place of controlled inner stillness, a place of non-thinking. At first it was just hard work. But over time he gained greater control over his thoughts and a whole new world opened up for him. He had never realized how much “noise” there was in his mind. It was as if there were a dozen different conversations going on at the same time, as though there were several versions of him inside himself, all vying to be heard. Master Ahn called it “self talk”, which he thought was a fine thing as long as one could manage the conversations so that only one conversation was going on at a time. In retrospect, as Anselm gained control over the internal noise, he came to wonder how he had been able to think at all with all that noise going on inside his head. For the first time in his life, he was experiencing clarity of thought. It was exhilarating.

“Tell me Anselm,” said Master Ahn. “Now that you have achieved clarity of thought, what are you going to think about?”

They were sitting on a log next to a stream that ran behind the dojo on its journey into the heavily forested valley below. It was mid-afternoon and already getting dark. The temperature that had hovered around freezing all day was dropping further as the sun sunk in the east. Anselm was glad for the heavy robe he wore over wool pants and shirt.

“I'm embarrassed to say that I haven't thought about it,” he replied.

“I have a little exercise for you to do,” said Master Ahn. “Perhaps it will help. Clear your mind but do not close your eyes.” For the first two months of Anselm's mantric practice, Master Ahn had allowed him to close his eyes during meditation, which made it easier to concentrate. But then he started requiring Anselm to do more and more of his meditation with his eyes open.

“Do you know why I make you meditate with your eyes open?” he asked Anselm.

“No.”

“Most people look but do not see,” he explained. “They look at the surface of things, but the inner essence of the thing, the reality of the thing, escapes them. This is because clarity of thought is the prerequisite to clarity of vision, and they do not yet have clarity of thought. Now do you know why I make you meditate with your eyes open?”

Anselm thought for a moment and realized that he did know after all. “One cannot see if one's eyes are closed.”

“That is so,” said Master Ahn.

He pointed to a cluster of crocuses pushing up through a snow bank. Then to one of the purple flowers. Then to a single petal. “Do you see this petal?” Anselm looked at the flower. “Yes. I see it.” He was puzzled. Master Ahn was not given to asking superfluous questions.

“Are you sure?”

Ah, he thought. A test. Anselm centered his thoughts and quieted his mind, systematically shutting out everything else – the brightness of the snow embracing the flowers, the sound of a chickadee singing forlornly in a nearby pine tree, the smell of juniper needles, the caress of a breeze across his face – until it was just him and the petal. Shape: long narrow, oval. Form: slightly concave on the upper surface. Color: deep violet at the edges, gradually changing to mostly white near the center of the flower where it meets the other five petals. His eyes traced the central vein from the flower's yellow center to the tip of the petal. Smaller veins branched off and reached out to the petal's edges.

“Shape, form, color, structure, simplicity,” he finally said.

“Indeed,” said Master Ahn. “Nothing is wasted. Everything about it has a purpose. It is efficient. But to what end?”

“I do not know.”

“Perhaps you should observe it some more.”

by **Anselm** on June 24th, 2012, 3:23 am

Anselm brought up his mantra again and focused on it to the exclusion of everything else. Soon it receded into the background. It was still there but seemed to be maintaining itself without his help. He would later realize that Master Ahn had used Auristics to gently shape Anselm's aura to enable him to dwell both inside and outside at the same time. Having done it once with a master's help, Anselm would, with practice, be able to do it by himself from then on.

Having again narrowed his world down to just himself and the flower petal, he followed its central vein from the outer edge to the flower's yellow center which, upon closer examination, turned out to be made up of tiny yellow stalks. Six filament-thin stalks stood guard around a single, somewhat thicker stalk in the middle. Each of the outer stalks was covered with white pollen. The middle stalk was topped by a tiny flattened sphere. He became aware of the sound of a bumblebee that soon flew into his peripheral vision. It buzzed around one flower, then another and then another. Finally it came to Anselm's flower, where it landed on the central stalk and appeared to be drinking from it. As it did, it's rear legs collected pollen from the outer stalks. After a few moments the bee flew off.

He pulled his mind away from the flower and let the wider world once again come fully into his awareness. He looked around a spotted another cluster of crocuses, which were also attracting bumblebees. He wondered if one of them was the very bee he had just seen.

“What is the flower petal's purpose in the world?” Asked Master Ahn.

“Its purpose is to attract the bumblebee. Evidently bumblebees like purple.”

“That is so,” agreed the old man. “Let us take stock of what we have observed. We have observed the petal's shape, its color and its structure. Form follows function. Everything in the world has a purpose. By observing the form of the flower petal, we have discovered what its purpose in the world is. We now know the part it plays in the great symphony of life.”

by **Anselm** on June 24th, 2012, 3:51 am

Two weeks later Anselm found himself again sitting on the same log with Master Ahn. And again Master Ahn drew his attention to the same crocus flower. The petal he had observed two weeks earlier was gone, along with three other petals, leaving only two and they looked like they would soon fall off the flower as well.

Master Ahn said, “The petal we observed before is gone now. Observe its absence and tell me what you see.”

This struck Anselm as an odd thing to do, but there was no point in objecting. Master Ahn would just smile and nod sagely and repeat his instruction. So Anselm settled into a meditative state and systematically shut everything out except the empty space that had once been occupied by a purple and white flower petal. Observe its absence. What does that mean? What is the meaning of its absence? If he had learned anything in the last few months at Ahn's Mountain, he had learned patience. He stared at the empty space. After a while his eye caught a movement in the background of his field of vision. His focus moved to the ground beneath the flower where he observed a beetle climbing over a small pile of decaying flower petals. Possibly one of them was the petal he had examined earlier. How did you arrive at this place at this time? He imagined the petal telling its story.

The bulb slept through the winter undisturbed by the rain and snow and ice that alternately blanketed the ground above, unaware of the winter storms that passed through, oblivious to the stamping of boots as the disciples of Master Ahn made there way back and forth between the compound's buildings. At some point it awoke from its slumber, probably triggered by the gradual warming of the ground as Winter gave way to Spring. The bulb put forth a tiny sprout which, responding to the beckoning call of the sun, began a slow and certain journey toward the surface. All around it other tendrils were beginning a similar journey. It broke through the surface and reveled in Syna's warmth. It grew faster now, rising to its full height in a matter of days. And then the purple and white petals unfolded to reveal the stalks that would ensure future generations of crocuses. Bumblebees came and went. Pollen was exchange with others of its kind. The petals, having served their purpose, wilted and fell to the ground, where they slowly decayed and returned to the soil from which they had come.

“Tell me Anselm,” said Master Ahn. “What have you observed?”

“I have observed that the crocus petal has a past, a present and a future,” he answered.

“That is so,” agreed Master Ahn. “We have observed a great deal, haven't we? We now know the petal's form, its function and its biography. But tell me, how did we learn these things?”

Anselm was tempted to say, “Observation.” But that was only part of the answer. Clarity of thought and imagination also played a role. As did patience and concentration.

“Meditation,” he said.

“That is so,” said Master Ahn. "Meditation is the key that unlocks the doors of reality, allowing you to see things as they really are."

by **Anselm** on June 24th, 2012, 3:54 am

It was snowing the next morning when Anselm left the bunk house. The whole world had morphed into shades of gray. He followed the stream down hill a ways until he reached a small clearing. He had brought a small canvas tarp from the bunk house, which he now laid on the ground. He sat on it cross-legged and tossed a few crusts of bread out in front of himself. Then he meditated with his eyes open.

After a while he became aware of a movement in the bushes to his left, about ten feet away. He turned his head slightly in that direction. It was a field mouse. It was eying the bread crusts. Anselm had already emptied his mind of distractions. Now he concentrated his attention wholly on the mouse. He could see it's tiny whiskers twitching this way and that. It's nose was busily sniffing at the air. It's beady black eyes looked here and there nervously. He counted the toes on its front feet. He studied the subtle changes in the color of the hair on various parts of its body. What is it like to be you? He wondered. He imagined what the world must look like from the mouse's perspective so close to the ground. The smells, the tiny breezes, the snowflakes falling on its head and back, the literal ground-level view of the world, the constant fear of predators, the bread crusts only a few feet away. Suddenly the mouse bolted across the intervening distance, grabbed a crust, fled back into the bushes and was gone.

“Animals are more difficult to observe than plants.” He turned his head enough to see Master Ahn standing a few feet away from him.

“Why is that?” Anselm asked.

“Because there is so much more to them, so much more going on, so many more dimensions to explore before you really get to know them.”

They were both silent for a while. Then Master Ahn turned and walked back toward the compound. After a while Anselm followed.

Many years later, when Anselm reflected back on this conversation, he would realize that he had come to Ahn's Mountain looking for one kind of power, and Master Ahn had showed him another kind of power; a power much greater than what he had sought in the first place; the power to see things as they really are.

by **Cascade** on July 5th, 2012, 1:26 pm

Adventurer's Loot

Anselm's Loot :

Good thread. Master Ahn seems to be quite the mentor. I like the introspection you put into this. Only a good writer can describe a simple petal to such lengths. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to PM me!