A Pilgrimage Of One Breath

What is the simplest, most universal instruction for meditation, the one that erases any distinction between the advanced and the beginner? "Let the mind rest in the heart."

I found this instruction in the ancient yogic text, Vijnana Bhairava, repeated verbatim in the classic prayer manual of the Orthodox Church, The Philocalia, and in a thrush song from the cedar grove just beyond my back yard. "Let the mind rest in the heart."

The world so tightly wrapped around you softens and bursts open like a bud. The golden splendor of a single sun glows through a hundred thousand petals, and the fragrance of God arises.

From your brow to your sternum, the journey is hardly more than twelve inches, a pilgrimage of one breath. But this is the supreme adventure. There is no greater quest than to be still, yet travel from the beginning to the end of time.

Descend into the heart by means of this exhalation. Be annihilated in the bright darkness that was here before God said, "let there be light." Now breathe in, letting the new creation kindle your chest. Never underestimate the power of one awakened breath to transform the world for a thousand miles in every direction.

But alas, no one who makes this pilgrimage ever returns. Entwined by threads of grace in your hridaya, you dissolve like a caterpillar in a silken chrysalis. When you inhale, rainbows unfurl your eyes. Flinging tears from your crystal wings, you arise like a flaming serpent.

Inside, you feel the unfathomable silence of perfect night. Outside, your roaring shakes the stars.

Art by William Blake: there are countless ineffable mysteries of meditation in this engraving.