Vinaire's Blog

Reference: Book III: What is the Mind Really?

The Main Ideas

1. The formula for looking is “Be there and Confront.”
2. To “be there” is to have your attention in total harmony and focused.
3. To “confront” means not to flinch, move away or avoid.
4. It takes looking as above to discover what is truly there.
5. Practice looking at physical objects, such as, a chair, a room, a sick person, pain, blood, etc.
6. Practice looking at looking at mental objects, such as, thoughts, feelings, emotions, anxiety, dread, etc.
7. Inability to look wraps up a person in delusions and conditioning.

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Looking is more than directing one’s eyes toward an object. The formula for genuine looking is: Be there and confront. To look is to place one’s attention fully on what is present and to remain with it without retreating into distraction, avoidance, explanation, or fear.

The Formula of Looking

“Be there and confront” describes two inseparable actions. First, one must be present; then one must be willing to face what is present exactly as it is.

A person may glance at something without truly looking at it. They may see a chair, for example, and immediately label it “old,” “ugly,” “expensive,” or “mine.” In that instant, attention shifts from the chair itself to remembered associations, judgments, and personal meanings. The person is no longer looking directly. They are looking through layers of thought.

To look is to let the object reveal itself before one decides what it means. It is an act of observation prior to interpretation.

To Be There

To be there means to have one’s attention gathered, steady, and in total harmony with what one is observing. Attention is not divided between the object and unrelated concerns. It is not half on the chair and half on tomorrow’s schedule, a past argument, or the desire to reach a conclusion.

Imagine entering a quiet room. You may be physically inside it while your mind is elsewhere. You notice only that it is “a room,” then continue thinking about a problem at work. In this condition, you are not there.

But if you pause and place your attention in the room, details begin to appear: the arrangement of furniture, the quality of light, faint sounds, the temperature, signs of use, and perhaps an object that does not belong. The room becomes more fully present because your attention has become present.

Being there does not require strain. It is not staring, forcing, or trying to produce an insight. It is simply the absence of wandering attention.

To Confront

To confront means not to flinch, move away, suppress, rationalize, or avoid. It means allowing attention to remain on the object, even when what is seen is unpleasant, confusing, painful, or contrary to one’s beliefs.

Confronting does not mean attacking an object or treating it as an enemy. It means facing it. One permits it to be known.

For example, a person may notice a crack in the foundation of a house. If they are unwilling to confront it, they may say, “It is probably nothing,” refuse to inspect it, or become busy with less important repairs. The crack remains, but now it is accompanied by avoidance. The problem has not been understood; it has merely been pushed out of awareness.

To confront the crack is to examine it: How large is it? Has it widened? What may have caused it? What action is needed? Clear observation becomes possible only when avoidance ends.

Looking at Physical Objects

The principle applies to ordinary physical objects. One can look at a chair, a room, a wound, a sick person, blood, or an accident. The object may be simple or disturbing, but the formula remains the same: be there and confront.

A doctor who sees only a diagnosis may miss the actual condition of the patient. A doctor who is there and confronts observes carefully: the person’s breathing, color, posture, speech, pain, history, and changes over time. The diagnostic label can be useful, but it must not replace observation.

Looking at blood may provoke an immediate recoil. That reaction is understandable, especially when blood signals injury or danger. But if someone must help, they need to regain presence. They must look at where the blood is coming from, how much there is, whether the person is conscious, and what care is urgently required. In such a moment, clear looking can make practical action possible.

Exercise: Looking at Physical Objects

In this exercise you are being there and confronting physical objects:

1. You may do this exercise while sipping coffee in a café or strolling along a river. 
2. With your eyes open look carefully at the physical world around you.
3. Make sure you are comfortable and not reacting to things.
4. If you are reacting to something then just keep confronting that thing calmly until reactions go away.
5. If in a café, look at the tables, the chairs, the space, the walls, the wallpaper, the pictures on the wall, the counter, etc.
6. If strolling along a river, look at the river, the banks of the river, the trees, the plants, the structures, the water, the birds, etc.
7. Look at the people around you as individuals, and as a crowd. Observe their forms, mannerisms, moods, etc.
8. Become aware of the thoughts that arise as you look. Don’t suppress them. Let them come and go.
9. This exercise is completed when your attention has become harmonious and has remained harmonious for some time.
10. You may do this exercise as often as you wish, in as many different environments as you wish.

Looking at Mental Objects

The same formula applies to mental objects: thoughts, feelings, emotions, anxiety, dread, resentment, shame, and desire. These are also objects of observation, even though they are not physical things one can hold in the hand.

When anxiety arises, people often try to escape it immediately. They may distract themselves with entertainment, overwork, food, substances, argument, or constant activity. Such actions may provide temporary relief, but they do not necessarily reveal what anxiety consists of.

To be there with anxiety is to notice its actual form. Is it a tightness in the chest? A restless impulse to act? A stream of catastrophic images? A fear of failure? An unexamined demand for certainty? The more precisely one looks, the less anxiety remains a vague and overpowering cloud.

To confront anxiety is not to approve of it or surrender to it. It is to refuse to run away from the fact that it is present. One can say inwardly: “Anxiety is here. Let me see what it is made of.” This opens the possibility of discovering the assumptions, memories, conflicts, or circumstances that sustain it.

Exercise: Looking at Mental Objects

In this exercise ou are being there and confronting mental objects:

1. Find a place where you can sit comfortably for a while without being disturbed. 
2. Sit in a comfortable position and close your eyes.
3. Sit silently and still without moving. Nothing should be added to BE there.
4. You will usually see blackness or an area of the space.
5. Become aware of the body and stay aware of it without interfering with, or resisting its natural movements, such as, breathing.
6. Become aware of the mind and stay aware of it without interfering with, or suppressing, its natural processes, such as, thoughts, emotions, and feelings.
7. Let physical reactions, such as, twitches in muscles, minor pains and aches, sleepiness, etc., come and go. Such reactions shall unwind and settle down on their own accord.
8. Let mental reactions, such as, embarrassment, guilt, anxiety, anger, fear, grief, apathy, and even sleep, come and go. Such reactions shall unwind and settle down on their own accord.
9. This exercise is completed when your attention has become harmonious and has remained harmonious for some time. The mental objects need not vanish.
10. You may do this exercise as often as you wish, in as many different environments as you wish.

Discovering What Is There

It takes looking to discover what is truly there. Before looking, a person may have only assumptions, labels, memories, fears, and conditioned responses. These may contain some truth, but they are not the same as direct observation.

A child may hear that a dog is dangerous and become afraid of all dogs. Later, when encountering a calm dog, the child may respond not to the animal before them but to a conditioned image of danger. To be there and confront means observing the dog: its posture, movement, sounds, behavior, and the circumstances of the encounter.

This does not mean ignoring genuine danger. Clear looking is not foolishness. It distinguishes actual danger from imagined danger, and it permits an appropriate response in either case.

In the same way, a person may believe, “I am always angry,” or “I am a failure.” These statements can become fixed identities. But careful looking may show that anger appears under certain conditions, or that the sense of failure is tied to one event, one comparison, or one unmet expectation. What seemed absolute becomes specific, observable, and open to understanding.

When people cannot look, they are easily wrapped in delusions produced by belief and conditioning. Belief supplies ready-made conclusions; conditioning supplies automatic reactions. Together, they can prevent a person from seeing what is directly before them.

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