Debbie studies art at a small university in the middle part of the country, far from the ocean and far from the city. She is serious about learning the art she has chosen. One of her teachers has given her an assignment to help improve her skills in visualizing.
She is to create an image that illustrates what it is like to suddenly recognize a tree that stands alone in a green and peaceful place. She is already a modestly skilled artist. This assignment is an advanced exercise designed to help her develop her powers of seeing things.
Her teacher has instructed her, “To know what it is like to suddenly see a tree, you must sit quietly in a comfortable place and confront the problem. Look at the tree. Then, with your eyes closed, roll your head around just a little and find a comfortable position. Suddenly open your eyes, but do not move your eyes to look for the tree because by then it will be too late to see how you knew the tree. Eyes still! Watch the tree appear in your vision.” The teacher paused a little. “Now, while looking straight ahead, just ask yourself, ‘How did I know it was a tree?’ Practice this, and let me know what you discover.”
Debbie practiced diligently, at least two hours every afternoon. At first the tree was just always there to be seen without much going on. By the end of the first day, she noticed that there was a short delay between opening her eyes and seeing the tree. On the second day, Debbie noticed that the details of the tree did not appear all at once as the tree appeared. By the fourth day, she could easily see the tree unfold gradually in her eyes, from not there to barely there, to more and more detail, all in maybe a half of a second or less. That was very interesting, but she kept practicing to see what else she could discover.
Several more afternoons passed, and then Debbie got a surprise. She had closed her eyes and waited a little longer before popping them open again. The tree was gone. In its place was flowing light of many colors with shimmering silvery threads peeking out from between the hues. Debbie saw this amazing sight for only a few seconds, and then the tree was there among the things around it. It was as if her mind had for a moment neglected to notice what trees look like. She saw the flowing light become a tree all made of that gently sparkling light. The earth, grass, and sky grew out of the same light. And then there was the tree just as she had always seen it, standing in the grass, reaching up from the ground toward the sky above.
Debbie told her instructor, as best she could, what she had seen. But the instructor told her to go back and look again. He told her she might have overlooked something.
Debbie returned to the tree to look again. And look again, and again, and again to see what she might have missed. A week passed, then another. Now and then she saw the flowing light again, but not the same as it was the first time. She understood how the experience of seeing the tree grew in the light of her vision in these afternoons. Sometimes she recognized the silvery threads merging together with her vision and understanding. There was a hint of it in every glance. But she was sad that she had not seen anything really different.
One day Debbie wearily closed her eyes to try again. When she popped her eyes open again, she was not really looking for anything at all. She was just looking to see what was there. And there it was. There was the flowing color and silver, all in its original brilliance and mystery, and this time it was very different. This time it was Debbie’s own mind that painted the light with her own memories of trees and earth and sky and all else that she could see. It happened inside her, that the memories of colors and forms of things flowed out into the light to lay down in her mind’s eye the simple perception of this one tree beneath this one sky.
“Good,” said the instructor. “Now turn that into art so someone else can see it too.”
——
What was Debbie aware of in the moment before she recognized the tree?
What was she aware of in the moment she recognized the tree?
What happened between those two moments?
What else happened before and after recognition?
What does recognition look like?
What does it feel like?
When she recognized the tree, what was it that she first recognized about the tree?
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In context: 5 - Appearing and Appearance