Mirror Meditation
Mirror Meditation
Mirror Meditation
Some days I will stare at myself in the mirror. I did it early morning the other day at my job. In the warm and stale atmosphere of the men’s bathroom I patiently looked into my own eyes. It was bizarre and relaxing at the same time. With each second I interlocked my eyes and transfixed my focus on my face. Surprisingly, it was hard trying to focus on one spot. I felt some type of serene numbness in my face. Nothing clinical feeling, but I gradually started to hear my breath. Not just the outer pace and rhythm, but I could feel my nose breathing and the vibrations in the middle of my face. It was almost as if I become conscious of the breathing I was not controlling or trying to control.
The glowing aura of the fluorescent bulbs up above quickly left my irritable consciousness.
I felt like I was looking at a different person in the mirror and watching him breathe more than myself. I began to see changes in my face. Things started to look less symmetrical and appealing. My face was just the way it with it was. Relaxed and not striving to show in ecstatic emotion. I felt as my face was statuesque, stoic and unmoved. It almost felt like I was gradually detaching from the reflection in the mirror. A real, “Who’s Looking at Who?” type of scenario.
It felt meditative. ( however you want to interpret that term.) I saw it as meditation through the process of just being with myself, observing the person I think I know in front of me. There wasn’t a feeling of withdrawal, depression or disconnection, but more of a release and connection with what is. A meditation on the observed and the observed. A witness to myself and the image of who I think I am and what I look like. It seemed strange in many ways. It seemed like it would be quite chilling and awkward for anyone to walk in on me doing mirror meditation, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not good for everyone around me.
I asked.
Who is actually doing the breathing?
Who is actually doing the thinking?
( Is it me I’m looking for? )
These questions seem weird at first. I mean you are essentially having a staring contest with yourself. How bizarre. It felt as if the observation of myself had lead to me not trying to control my breath or movement of any kind. Whatever my body willed, I would allow, but not “try” to move for the sake of moving.
It’s almost as if I had an out of body experience. My reflection and my sense of self were melding. The lines blurring between my bodily sensations and the extreme sense of awareness and focus present in my vision. It was almost as if I couldn’t take my eyes off myself. ( Whoever that was...) But it wasn’t my self. Only a reflection. A projection of how I perceive this worldly and material body.
“ A brief actualization of non-resistance. Surrendering to a gaze that I released control of the need to control.”
// Observation of the dwindling of cyclical thoughts. //
Thoughts and the world in your periphery slowly fade to the point you are so transfixed on your face that you cannot look away. No more thoughts or worries penetrate your consciousness. Then there is a real sense of “me” time. Then the me starts to melt and transmute into the still image of yourself in front of your eyes. I was literally standing in front of the mirror looking at myself, but having an in depth experience by peering into the doing of being. The observance of I seeing the doings of being.
Staring into the thing that you think that is you.
Soon it felt as if the line between my reflection and my actual body was blurring. Lost, but locked into the focus of the staring. No thought or sense of time in the moment. Within this sacred moment any distraction could break the focus. Any odd imagined movement could throw of the flow of focus. During this meditation, there was no thought of trying to do something else. No thought of things that needed to get done during the day. A freedom from the need or obligation to complete or compete.
( I can only imagine how weird it would be for someone to see me staring at myself in the mirror. Chilling, if you will. )
The monkey mind seeking mechanism had disappeared if only for a few seconds even if those seconds felt like minutes. Once again, the sense of time was muted and not flying around me like an annoying gnat.
How glorious it is to be able look at your reflection. To take the time to be still. To be with yourself in all types of levels. It’s a marriage and a dance of perception.
Some may call it staring into the void. The universe conscious of itself. The unbecoming of unbecoming. The dissolving of the “I”. As I stare into this abyss of myself, I for a small portion of time lose this sense of the I, all the whole transfixed upon the two eyes that are staring back into myself or the low resolution of what I think of myself.
Staring.
Not attempting to stare.
Not attempting to grasp.
Staring and standing with what is.
A truly Out of Body experience melded out of mind while not minding the activities of the mind.
DG
Mirror Meditation
Some days I will stare at myself in the mirror. I did it early morning the other day at my job. In the warm and stale atmosphere of the men’s bathroom I patiently looked into my own eyes. It was bizarre and relaxing at the same time. With each second I interlocked my eyes and transfixed my focus on my face. Surprisingly, it was hard trying to focus on one spot. I felt some type of serene numbness in my face. Nothing clinical feeling, but I gradually started to hear my breath. Not just the outer pace and rhythm, but I could feel my nose breathing and the vibrations in the middle of my face. It was almost as if I become conscious of the breathing I was not controlling or trying to control.
The glowing aura of the fluorescent bulbs up above quickly left my irritable consciousness.
I felt like I was looking at a different person in the mirror and watching him breathe more than myself. I began to see changes in my face. Things started to look less symmetrical and appealing. My face was just the way it with it was. Relaxed and not striving to show in ecstatic emotion. I felt as my face was statuesque, stoic and unmoved. It almost felt like I was gradually detaching from the reflection in the mirror. A real, “Who’s Looking at Who?” type of scenario.
It felt meditative. ( however you want to interpret that term.) I saw it as meditation through the process of just being with myself, observing the person I think I know in front of me. There wasn’t a feeling of withdrawal, depression or disconnection, but more of a release and connection with what is. A meditation on the observed and the observed. A witness to myself and the image of who I think I am and what I look like. It seemed strange in many ways. It seemed like it would be quite chilling and awkward for anyone to walk in on me doing mirror meditation, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not good for everyone around me.
I asked.
Who is actually doing the breathing?
Who is actually doing the thinking?
( Is it me I’m looking for? )
These questions seem weird at first. I mean you are essentially having a staring contest with yourself. How bizarre. It felt as if the observation of myself had lead to me not trying to control my breath or movement of any kind. Whatever my body willed, I would allow, but not “try” to move for the sake of moving.
It’s almost as if I had an out of body experience. My reflection and my sense of self were melding. The lines blurring between my bodily sensations and the extreme sense of awareness and focus present in my vision. It was almost as if I couldn’t take my eyes off myself. ( Whoever that was...) But it wasn’t my self. Only a reflection. A projection of how I perceive this worldly and material body.
“ A brief actualization of non-resistance. Surrendering to a gaze that I released control of the need to control.”
// Observation of the dwindling of cyclical thoughts. //
Thoughts and the world in your periphery slowly fade to the point you are so transfixed on your face that you cannot look away. No more thoughts or worries penetrate your consciousness. Then there is a real sense of “me” time. Then the me starts to melt and transmute into the still image of yourself in front of your eyes. I was literally standing in front of the mirror looking at myself, but having an in depth experience by peering into the doing of being. The observance of I seeing the doings of being.
Staring into the thing that you think that is you.
Soon it felt as if the line between my reflection and my actual body was blurring. Lost, but locked into the focus of the staring. No thought or sense of time in the moment. Within this sacred moment any distraction could break the focus. Any odd imagined movement could throw of the flow of focus. During this meditation, there was no thought of trying to do something else. No thought of things that needed to get done during the day. A freedom from the need or obligation to complete or compete.
( I can only imagine how weird it would be for someone to see me staring at myself in the mirror. Chilling, if you will. )
The monkey mind seeking mechanism had disappeared if only for a few seconds even if those seconds felt like minutes. Once again, the sense of time was muted and not flying around me like an annoying gnat.
How glorious it is to be able look at your reflection. To take the time to be still. To be with yourself in all types of levels. It’s a marriage and a dance of perception.
Some may call it staring into the void. The universe conscious of itself. The unbecoming of unbecoming. The dissolving of the “I”. As I stare into this abyss of myself, I for a small portion of time lose this sense of the I, all the whole transfixed upon the two eyes that are staring back into myself or the low resolution of what I think of myself.
Staring.
Not attempting to stare.
Not attempting to grasp.
Staring and standing with what is.
A truly Out of Body experience melded out of mind while not minding the activities of the mind.
DG
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