Crossing the Threshold
Read slowly, aloud, leaving a breath between lines; about fifteen minutes. Record it and play it back if you wish.
Before you begin. This is a light, story-based trance built on the frames of I.1–3. If you are in acute distress, have a history of psychosis or dissociation, or are currently severely depressed, use it only with a clinician who knows you. Never practise while driving, operating anything, or in or near water. Sit rather than lie down.
How to return at any moment. Open your eyes, press your feet into the floor, say your name and today's date aloud. Nothing in the practice requires you to stay.
Sit, and let the breath find its own pace.
Bring to mind one either/or that has stopped you: this duty or that one, this road or the other. Name it once, silently, and let it be.
Now breathe with two wings. Let the in-breath be knowing. Let the out-breath be doing. In, knowing. Out, doing. A bird does not choose between its wings. Breathe until neither is heavier than the other.
You are sitting with your father, or with someone who was a father to you. You have said your dilemma and fallen silent. He does not argue with the silence. He says: Hear a story. Weigh it in your mind, and then do as you choose.
And the story opens, and you go in.
A mountain peak in snow, peacocks on the rocks, falling water. A woman looks up, sees a messenger crossing the sky, and asks where he has been.
And the story opens again, and you go further in.
A king who has given away his kingdom sits among the trees. A chariot full of music stops beside him; he is offered heaven. When he hears that its joys are measured against one another, he says, quietly, Not that heaven. Feel what it is to want nothing that depends on comparison.
And the story opens once more, and you go all the way in.
A hermitage among ant-hills. An old poet asks gently how you are, and waits. Then he says what the book says to everyone who reaches this place: One who knows he is bound, and wishes to be free, is entitled to this teaching. You know. You wish. You are entitled.
Now look at the one fixed idea inside your question, the thing you have told yourself must be so. See it as a colour tinting a clear sky. Do not scrub it away. Simply stop adding to it, and watch the colour thin, as ice softens when the cold is gone.
(Silence: one to two minutes.)
Now come back the way you came. The poet hands you back to the king in the forest; the king to the messenger in the sky; the messenger to the woman on the peak; she to the room where your father sits. He asks nothing. You are carrying your question, and it is lighter.
I will count from one to five, and on five your eyes open, clear and rested.
One. The breath is ordinary and full.
Two. Feel your weight on the seat, your feet on the floor.
Three. The sounds of the room return.
Four. Move your fingers and toes; take one deeper breath.
Five. Eyes open. Here. Now. Fully alert.
Say your name aloud, the day and the place. Name three things you can see. Then say once what you choose to do with the story. If you feel at all hazy, count again from one to five and stand for a moment before you move on.
