To be silent.
What is the concept of silent contemplation?
To ponder? To think? To silently strive to understand? To question without words and to question without expecting an answer? Have you ever looked at a tree, or a fox, or a sunrise just to meditate? I recommend you try doing so.
There is a Chinese character that represents ‘the activity of the eye’; seeing, essentially. In the same way the typical statue of Buddha also represents this concept. A man sitting, silently contemplating, simply seeing. The Eastern practices of meditation are a reflection of this concept in relation to the philosophy of life. Alan Watts explains that, “fundamentally, meditation is not so much an exercise as it is a certain way of using one’s mind or one’s consciousness” (The Silent Mind). While it is natural to strain our senses beyond sight to understand what we are processing, I encourage you to try this form of meditation that allows your senses to be silent.
Find a space to release yourself from the strain of feeling, the strain of hearing. Focusing on a subject in nature that allows you to receive the information and to naturally and peacefully understand.
My understanding of silent contemplation goes along with the following thought:
What is the purpose of the question?
So… What is the purpose of the question? When we contemplate something, striving to understand it, it is natural to ask a question in search of an answer. But is the reason we ask questions so we can struggle and rack our brains to answer it? To make sense of it? Why? Why should we- or rather, do we need to- find an answer to everything we question?
Thought, in and of itself, can be linear as well as abstract while the sense of sight is not-so-simply the latter. With sight, we can see the whole picture in front of us if we simply receive the visual with no strain. To allow it to enter our eyes. Through this practice we can allow our mind to wander, to think without strain or pressure, to contemplate without searching for an answer. If we took the space and the peace to find ourselves silently contemplating a simple concept of nature, we might also find that with the question comes the greatest understanding where there is no answer at all.
I ask again; What is the purpose of the question?