Imagine a beautiful, clear pool set in a forest glade. You sit on a bench fashioned from a large, fallen tree, shaded from the sun. A gentle breeze that soothes your brow, leads every leaf, branch and bough in gentle dream dance over a drone of barely murmured pleasantries.
You gaze at the pool.
According to legend, a very wealthy person, pursued by bandits through the forest at night, cast his gold and glittering jewels into a pond in this very forest, meaning to retrieve them some later day. Having escaped the bandits and returned safely home, the following morning our wealthy man passed away from an unknown cause.
Gazing at the pool, you wonder: could this be the pond wherein the fabled treasure lies?
As you peer into the water, something falls into the pool and disturbs the surface, setting into motion a series of wavelets, flowing first outwards and then criss-crossing in all directions in a subtle, captivating choreography that charms and enthralls you.
As the wavelets subside, your reverie fades and you recall your previous thought of the treasure… – is that a glistening from below? At this moment, a sudden startling of wind galvanises a brief conniption, shattering your fleeting glimmer into untraceable gloom.
Each time you are about to see clearly into the depths, something else disturbs the water.
According to legend, that wealthy person was our soul, and the pond into which the treasure was thrown, the depth of our own being. The water’s surface is our mind. So long as our mind is agitated, we can never see, feel or claim our own hidden treasure.
To whomsoever can make their mind absolutely still, in that hallowed moment the treasure appears in the limpid pool and gives itself up.