It’s a delight to say I’ve finished authoring a new book, 50+ Miksang contemplative photographs I’ve “taken” over 12 years. Below is its Introduction. And here the ebook is an online, image-by-image as a Flipbook. Best viewed full screen. If you’d like it as a PDF please let me know.
As you view these photographs may I suggest choosing a time when you are not rushed nor in a hurry or have pressing obligations to meet. The images have something to communicate in addition to their surface features. Just allow them to come to you for a little get acquainted time. You might be surprised at your experience. In any case, I hope you enjoy them. Cheers - Ron
Introduction
Twelve years ago I began a journey that I am still on. It is a visual journey into the world of Miksang contemplative seeing and photography. In the Tibetan language the word miksang means good or pure eye. Some of the journey was in formal training with excellent teachers (more about them later) and at other times I traveled alone, allowing visual experience to arrive unbidden—without planning, forethought, or design.
What I saw emerged not because I was actively seeking particular perceptions but because they, in a sense, found me. Formal training taught me that whenever my discursive, conceptual, mind is at rest—is inactive and idling—it is free of beliefs, opinions, labeling, and judgments. This state allows perceptions to arrive "out of the blue." In such moments, experiences of beauty, joy, delight, poignancy, uniqueness, clarity or a combination of these qualities become possible.
Then, mind and body are at rest, arrested by the suddenness of seeing something totally new and unexpected. In these moments, a photograph is not “taken”, as in “I took a photograph”, but rather, the experience is one of receiving, as if a gift was given.
Such moments are universal for all of us, innately, yet we typically do not stop and appreciate them. Why so? Because of a lack of attention that stems from prevailing visual habits and identification with thoughts and thinking. This closes us off from a greater awareness and appreciation of the visual world.
However, as William Blake observed, “When the doors of perception are cleansed, everything appears as it is...infinite”. Then, the possibility of seeing an infinite world of delight becomes more common and enlightening.
I have tried on this journey to hold an intention to see in this manner, with "fresh eyes" and Miksang awareness. The photographs that follow express various fruitions of this intention and a still, quiet, and receptive mind. You will notice a wide variety of subject matter, since Miksang moments can occur at any time, at any place. You will also notice I omit saying anything about the photographs. To do so could alter your seeing them as I saw them, fresh, unfiltered and unconditional. I hope you enjoy them.
