A visualisation to aid meditation
A meditation exercise
Be still .......
withdraw from earthly surroundings....... try to quiet earth thoughts.
Walk towards a small copse and enter under the trees ... along a track, sunlight making moving patterns of light on the path in front ... glancing up see the sunlight shafting through the interlacing branches.
I hear the sounds of birds, on wing, the droning of bees among the flowered bushes, the noise of small animals passing through the undergrowth. Such muted sounds which please rather than disquiet.
I see the exit from the copse and pass through into a place of such tender beauty that I am halted and must needs still the beating of my heart. Within myself I am aware of the words "What place is this?" No voice replied but again within I know "It is the Valley of Silence".
My feet take me across and down the grassy slope which feels like soft velvet springing as I walk; ahead at the bottom of the slope and central I see a seat formed of rustic branches of all shapes; I sit down and become aware that there at my feet lies a shard of crystal; I know I must gaze into this and I do. I am floating in a sea of colours, all colours, brilliant and muted; I am shrinking, all is changing and then I see I have become a seed - I can see myself a small golden seed floating, floating, floating. As I watch the seed it is flung about as though in the grip of a mighty storm, yet there is no storm; then again it is still as if held by a gentle loving hand - I see no hand; then again the seed moves but as if in the way of a tiny breeze - I feel no breeze.
Yet I know without telling that the drifting and turbulent currents are my lives away from Home - so varied in their content, and the stillness as within a hand, the times when I return Home to await further work in other fields.
Here there is Silence, utter and complete, and yet within I hear all the sounds of life that is past, life present and life still to come. Here is, in very truth, eternity. An ecstasy fills my being, understanding is so close I would bring it within but as the thought is formed I am given understanding, firstly of myself - how weak I am - how wrong in many ways. In life, to understand others I must hold this knowledge of self, let it not be soiled by untruth, greed, desire for earthly gifts and power. Let me look at others and understand how fragile we all are and put out a hand not to put from me but to draw others here, so I may share with them the gracious gift of knowledge. To know I must always offer and take refusal in amita, to give in abundance to those who accept, knowing that my cup will be filled again and again from the eternal fountain.
My eyes become misted, the crystal becomes dull, the seed is no longer there, I am again its keeper. I am no longer within the Valley of Silence but its sound remains with me. I send forth a prayer that my Lord will leave this with me to strengthen endeavours and constancy in my future days.
Copyright 1982 The Erasmus Foundation.
The Erasmus Foundation, Moat House, Banyards Green, Laxfield, Suffolk. IP13 8ER. Tel: 01986 798682.
Registered charity no.281458
