The Unseen Stag: resting in the fourth
Read aloud, slowly; about fifteen minutes. Sit upright, eyes closed or resting on the floor.
Before you begin. This practice trains attention to let things pass without following them. Do not use it alone if you have a dissociative disorder, experiences of unreality or of not being in your body, or a psychotic illness; work with a clinician. Never practise while driving, operating anything, or in or near water.
How to return at any moment. Open your eyes, name five things you can see, and press your feet into the floor.
Let the breath settle.
Take inventory of the three bodies. First the body of hands and feet: feel the weight of the hands, the contact of the feet. Then the body of wishes: notice what you want right now, even small things, and let them be there. Then the third: the awareness that knows both. Rest attention there, lightly.
Put down the past act. Put down the future care. The only duty in your hand now is breathing. Do it well.
If a pull or a craving rises, let the reasoning mind answer with one calm sentence, this too can pass, and let the sentence do the work, as iron breaks iron.
Now imagine sitting as the sage sits, alone in a forest clearing, still. Around you, sounds of a chase: running, branches, a voice calling. They come, and they go. Notice that attention does not have to turn toward them.
A voice asks you a question. You do not need to answer it.
Now let a stag cross the clearing: a thought, a sensation, a memory that usually pulls you. Let it come in from one side. You are witness and spectator only. Let it cross. Let it leave by the other side, unfollowed.
Let another cross. Unfollowed.
Rest in evenness, like water in which the mud has settled. Clear above, quiet below.
(Silence: one to two minutes.)
The huntsman goes his own way. The clearing remains.
Now let the principle of life flow back into the limbs. Breathe more fully. Move the fingers. Move the feet.
One. Breath full and ordinary.
Two. Hands and feet warm and your own.
Three. Sounds of the room returning.
Four. Stretch, and roll the shoulders.
Five. Eyes open. Fully alert.
Say your name, the day and the place. Name three things you can see and one you can hear. If anything feels distant or unreal, look around the room, touch the chair, and count again from one to five before you stand. Then take up the present task.