I’ve been reading a book that, part way through, touches on the most radical and transformative element of Time-Light. The book is Robert M Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, ostensibly the story of a man’s motorcycle ride across America with his son, but actually an exploration of meaning, value and philosophy.
At one point, the narrator says something that almost made me drop the book: “Objects create the subject’s awareness of himself”. Now, that’s pretty close to my idea that, soon after our birth, the sense of an individual ‘I’ emerges from an upsetting experience, and that in turn creates the impression of a world separate from ourselves. As I arise, the world arises also.
Then, a few pages on, the narrator states: “Reality is always the moment of vision before the intellectualization takes place.” Now, it starts to get very interesting, although I say ‘pure experience’ rather than ‘reality’. And I’d substitute the semi-academic term ‘intellectualization’ for ‘you’. Now it reads: “Pure experience is always the moment of vision before you take place (or arise)”.
Pure experience doesn’t leave a footprint or energy trace. It passes through. A pure experience doesn’t have a ‘you’ having that experience; instead, pure vision happens when there is no ‘you’ creating the ‘separate thing’ – or before the subject/object divide occurs.
It sounds complicated but it’s really so simple. Just look at something. You’re not looking (unless your mind is already full of thoughts and worries) – there’s just looking, at a wall, a cup, or whatever.Within a second, ‘you’ arise, and now you’re looking at a cup. Pretty innocuous, perhaps, but suppose it’s something important in your life – possibly an argument or dispute.
As I say in Time-Light, the more ‘you’ are participating in an experience, the less true it is. An ‘untrue’ experience leaves a vibration or imprinting in the Psychological Past, and continues to repeat itself. This is because ‘you’ are the past – and what is happening is happening now. The dead past meeting the dynamic present is an awful mismatch, and one that will continue to reverberate through time.
Pure seeing is transformative because it happens outside of time, and only the timeless can heal the hurts of time.