I can't see you. Can you see me? I mean, I can see your body. I can see that you are reading. I can even see what you are reading. Well, not exactly. I can see that you are reading a Kindle. But I can't see what you are reading on the Kindle. Or why. Or how it will change you.
I can't see if you are happy or sad about what you are reading. I can't see who the characters remind you of.
Does one of them remind you of me? Am I there?
There are other things I can't see. Like me, for instance. I mean, I can see my shirt, my pants. But why do I do the things I do? I don't know. I don't see that. I can't see that.
I can see some things that motivate me. Relationships, opportunities, dinner. But I know there are other things. The false idols: security, power, ego. That's another side of the things I can't see.
I think there is a relationship between how real something is and how well I see it. The less real something is, the better I see it. And the more real something is, the worse I see it. Reality seems to be a cloud that obscures vision.
For example, I can see that we are separate, that I am me and you are you. I can see that with absolute clarity. But that isn't true. In the world of the real, there is no you. There is no me. There isn't even an us. There just is.
But to see that, I must close my eyes. I must quiet myself. I must let go of analysis. I must forget about past and future. I must embrace stillness.
Then I can see it. But even then, just for an instant. Before it dissolves again into the world of make believe.
But in that instant I get a glimpse of the you that isn't you and the me that isn't me and the us that extends beyond knowing.
I get only a glimpse, and only for an instant.
But it is enough.
Spiritual Question: What do you see when you get those momentary glimpses of the real? What would it be like to always see with those eyes?
This piece was written at the Roundhouse Writing Group, Santa Cruz, Guatemala on 7/2/18. The writing prompt for the session was: Write about something you can't see.
The photo is by Krzysztof Urbanowicz, made available via Flickr and Creative Commons. Some rights reserved.
