Rough and jagged, organic, cool
For the past two weeks, we reflected on where and how we place our attention. Attention is the way we connect with the world around us and it’s an indicator of what we care about.
It’s the way we touch and are touched by the world through our mind.
The physical sense of touch is an intimate way of immediately connecting with the world around us through our body. This pandemic year has made it quite clear how essential touch is to being human. And, many of us are suffering from a lack of touch. I read somewhere that this has been a great year for dogs and cats because they’re getting so much physical touch.
While taking a Miksang contemplative photography workshop in Boulder, Colorado, one of the assignments was to notice textures – and to photograph what would give the viewer a felt sense of touch. Textures are subtle and tend to fall into the category of things that we overlook. They often don’t have any hidden meaning. They’re just there, waiting for us to see. I know I was surprised at how much there was to discover when I took notice of our textured world.
The world around us is full of all kinds of textures - smooth, slick, rough, granular, prickly, soft, hard, leathery, gritty, bumpy. cushiony, coarse, fine, etc. I’ve grown accustomed to noticing and appreciating textures and it adds immensely to my experience to reach out and touch. Maybe this is the perfect time to connect physically with the world around you through this sense of touch.
What does this have to do with seeing clearly? Well, I’ve come to believe, and Laura Sewall corroborates in the quote below, that opening up the physical senses in our everyday experiences helps us to see more clearly.
”The realm opened to us by our eyes is not just the visual field, but the whole of the sensory cosmos. The way we see is profoundly influenced by what we hear or even taste, by the way we imagine their textures feel.” ~ Laura Sewall, Sight and Sensibility
Practice
This week, give yourself permission to reach out and touch as much as possible. Notice that what you touch also touches you back. Feel your skin and your mind being touched by the world in meaningful encounters.
Feel yourself being touched by the ground as you walk or the chair as you sit or the bed as you lie down.
Walk barefoot if possible or lie or sit down on the ground.
Feel yourself being touched by the air.
Open your mouth and taste the air.
If it’s raining or snowing, consider it a bonus and let the rain touch you.
If you’re confined to home, touch as many surfaces as you can find.
Give some loving to your pets if you’re lucky enough to have them.
Write a list of things you touch and try to describe how they feel. See article on words for textures under Resources.
Make a photographic record too if you’d like and share some on Instagram (add the hashtag #seeingclearly2021).
How many different textures do you encounter in a week? How does adding touch to your encounters help you to see more clearly?
Resources
Miksang Contemplative Photography
Even During Quarantine, you need a Daily Dose of Touch
Books mentioned in this project can be found here.
If you’d like to subscribe to these weekly posts for 2021, you can do so through the button below.
P.S. This project is free and available for all. You can support the work by signing up and sharing on social media or telling your friends! You can also provide financial support by making a one-time or monthly payment. Either way is greatly appreciated. See the archive here. If you’re on the free list, you can share photos and reflections on Instagram and add the hashtag #seeingclearly2021. Paid subscribers will have access to comments on the posts and some additional posts.
Yesterday we had one of those days where the snow falls lightly and gently all day. It was blowing southward so when I walked north it was touching my face, sticking on my eyebrows. I tasted it, a natural freezee, so refreshing, melt in your mouth.
Moss: soft, spongy, shades of green, browns, bits of blue, moist, sopping wet, tinder dry, thick and moist. Flying bits of moss. Thick chunks of moss. Tree held up by moss. Freshly scented moss. Spent this afternoon introducing myself to moss, lovely soft, swishy, squishy moss