Turning the Light around & Keeping to the Center
Where did the term “Turning the Light around” begin? It began with the adept When-Che. When the Light is turned around, the energies of heaven and earth, yin and yang, all congeal. This is what is called refined thought — pure energy or pure thought. When you first put this technique into practice, there is seemingly non-being within being. Eventually, when the work is accomplished, and there is a body beyond your body — there is seemingly being within non-being. Only after a hundred days of concentrated work is the light real. Only then is it the fire of spirit. After a hundred days the light is spontaneous. A point of true positive energy suddenly produces a pearl. Then you should attend it calmly and quietly. The turning around of the light is the firing process.
In the original creation there is positive light, which is the ruling director. In the material world, it is the sun. In human beings, it is the eyes. Nothing is worse than to have a running leakage of spirit and consciousness. This is conformity. So The Way of the Golden Flower is accomplished completely through the method of reversal. Turning the light around is not turning around the light of one body, but turning around the very energy of creation. It is not stopping random imagination only temporarily, it is truly emptying routine compulsion for all time.
Just observe clearly and when your breath grows quiet, you then become acutely aware. This is application of the method of reversal. This is a practice that pervades The Three Teachings. The light is neither inside nor outside The Self. Mountains, rivers, sun, moon and the whole earth are all this light. So it is not only in The Self. All the operations of intelligence, knowledge and wisdom are also this light. So it is not outside The Self. The light of heaven and earth fills the universe. The light of one individual also naturally extends through the heavens and covers the earth.
Therefore once you turn the light around, everything in the world is turned around. The light rays are concentrated upward, into the eyes. This is the great key of the human body. You should reflect on this.
If you do not sit quietly each day, this light flows and whirls, stopping who knows where? If you can sit quietly for a while, all time, ten thousand ages, a thousand lifetimes, is penetrated from this. All phenomena revert to stillness. Truly inconceivable is this sublime truth.
Nevertheless the actual practice goes from shallow to deep, from crude to fine. Throughout it is best to be consistent. The practice is one from beginning to end. But its quality during the process can be known only by oneself.
It is necessary to wind up at the point where heaven is open, earth is broad and all things are just as they are. For only this can be considered attainment.
What has been communicated through successive sages is not beyond reversed gazing. Confucians call it “reaching towards knowledge.” Buddhists call it “observing mind.” Taoists call it “inner observation.” The words “focus on the center” are most sublime. The center is omnipresent. The whole universe is within it. This indicates the mechanism of creation. You focus on this to enter The Gate. That is all. To focus on this means to focus on this as a hint — not to become rigidly fixated. The meaning of the word focus has life to it. It is very subtle.
The terms ‘stopping’ and ‘seeing’ basically cannot be separated. They mean concentration and insight. Hereafter, whenever thoughts arise, you don’t need to sit still as before. But you should investigate this thought. Where is it? Where does it come from? Where does it disappear? Push this inquiry on and on, over and over, until you realize it cannot be grasped. Then you will see where the thought arises. You don’t need to seek out the point of arising any more.
Having looked for my mind, I realize it cannot be grasped. I have pacified your mind for you. This is correct seeing. Whatever is contrary to this is false seeing. Once you reach this ungraspability, then as before, you continuously practice stopping, and continue it by seeing. Practice seeing and continue it by stopping. This is twin cultivation of stopping and seeing. This is turning the Light around.
The turning around is stopping. The light is seeing. Stopping without seeing is called turning around without light. Seeing without stopping is called having light without turning it around. Remember this.
Turning the light around and tuning the breath… The doctrine just requires singleminded practice. One does not seek experiential proof, but experiential proof comes of itself. On the whole, beginners suffer from two kinds of problems: oblivion and distraction. There is a device to get rid of them, which is simply to rest the mind on the breath. The breath is one’s own mind. One’s own mind does the breathing. Once mind stirs, then there is energy. Energy is basically an emanation of mind.
Our thoughts are very rapid. A single random thought takes place in a moment, whereupon an exhalation and inhalation respond to it. Therefore inward breathing and outward breathing accompany each other like sound and echo.
In a single day one breathes countless times, so has countless random thoughts. When the luminosity of spirit has leaked out completely, one is like a withered tree or dead ashes. So should one have no thoughts? It is impossible to have no thoughts. Should one not breathe? It is not impossible not to breathe. Nothing compares to making the affliciction itself into medicine: which means to have mind and breath rest on each other. Therefore tuning the breath should be included in turning the light around.
This method makes use of two lights: one is the light of the ears, one is the light of the eyes. Clarity of hearing and seeing are both one and the same spiritual light. When you see it, lower your eyelids and then establish a point of reference. Now, let go. But if you let go absolutely, you may not be able to simultaneously keep your mind on listening to your breathing. You should not allow your breathing to actually be audible. Just listen to its soundlessness. Once there is sound, you are bouyed by the coarse, and do not enter the fine. Then be patient and lighten up a little. The more you let go, the greater the subtletly; and the greater the subtlety, the deeper the quietude.
Eventually, after a long time, all of a sudden, even the subtle will be interrupted and the true breathing will appear. Whereupon the substance of mind will become perceptible. This is because when mind is subtle, breath is subtle. When mind is unified, it moves energy. When breath is subtle, mind is subtle. When energy is unified, it moves mind.
Stabilization of mind must be preceded by development of energy, because the mind has no place to set to work on. So focus on energy is used as a starting point. This is what is called the preservation of pure energy. Movement is pulling the strings. The word movement is another word for control. Since you can cause movement by vigorous action, how could you not be able to cause stillness by pure quiettude?
The great sages saw the interrelation of mind and energy, and simply set up an expedient for the benefit of people of later times. An alchemical text says: the hen embraces the egg, always mentally listening. These are the finest instructions. The way a hen can give life to an egg is through warm energy. Warm energy can only warm the shell and cannot penetrate the inside, so she mentally conducts the energy inward. That listening is singleminded concentration. When the mind enters, the energy enters. With warm energy, the birth takes place. Therefore even though the mother hen goes out from time to time, she is always listening. And the concentration of her spirit is never interrupted. Since the concentration of the spirit is never interrupted, then the warm energy is also uninterrupted day and night. So the spirit comes alive.
The life of the spirit comes from the prior death of the mind. If people can kill the mind, The Original comes alive. Killing the mind does not mean quietism, it means undivided concentration. The Buddha said,
“Place the mind on one point, and everything can be done.”
If the mind tends to run off, then unify it by means of the breath. If the breath tends to become rough, then use the mind to make it fine. If you do this, how can the mind fail to stabilize?
Generally speaking, the two afflictions of oblivion and distraction just require quietening practice to continue unbroken day after day, until complete cessation and rest occur spontaneously. When you are not sitting quietly you may be distracted without knowing it. But once you are aware of it, distraction itself becomes a mechanism for getting rid of distraction.
As for unawares oblivion, and oblivion of which you become aware, there is an inconceivable distance between then. Unawares oblivion is real oblivion. Oblivion that you notice not completely oblivious. Clear light is in this.
Distraction means the spirit is racing. Oblivion means the spirit is unclear. Distraction is easy to cure. Oblivion is hard to heal. Using the metaphor of illness, one that involves pain or itch can be treated with medicine, but oblivion is a symptom of paralysis where there is no feeling. A distracted mind can be concetrated, and a confused mind can be set in order. But oblivion is unformed darkness in contrast to distraction, which still has some direction.
Oblivion means the lower soul is in complete control. Whereas the lower soul is a lingering presence in distraction. Oblivion is ruled by pure darkness and negativity.
When you are sitting quietly, if you become drowsy, this is oblivion. Repelling oblivion is simply a matter of tuning the breath. The breath in this case is respiration, not the true breathing. Neveretheless the true breathing is present within it.
Whenever you sit, you should quiet your mind and unify your energy. How is the mind quietened? The mechanism is in the breathing, but the mind alone knows you are breathing out and in.
Do not let the ears hear. When you don’t hear it, the breathing is fine. And when the breathing is fine, the mind is clear. If you can hear it, the breathing is rough. Which means the mind is cloudy. Cloudiness means oblivion, so it is natural to feel sleepy. Even so, the mind should be kept on the breathing.
It is also essential to understand that this device is not mechanical or forced. Just maintain a subtle looking and listening. What is looking? It is the light of the eyes, spontaneously shining. The eyes are only looking inward, and not outward.
Not looking outward, yet being alert, is inward looking. It is not that there really is such a thing as looking inward. What is listening? It is the light of the ears spontaneously listening. The ears only listening inward, and not outward. Not listening outward, yet being alert, is inward listening. It is not that there really is such a thing as listening inward. Listening means listening to the soundless. Looking means looking at the formless. When the eyes do not look outside, and the ears do not listen outside, they are closed-in, and have a tendency to race-around inside. Only by inward-looking and listening can you prevent this inner racing, as well as oblivion in between. This is the meaning of sun and moon combining their vitalities and lights.
When you sink into oblivion and become drowsy, get up and take a walk. When your spirit has cleared, sit again. It is best to sit for a while, in the early morning, when you have free time. Afternoon time, when there are many things to do, it is easy to fall into oblivion.
Also there is no need to fix the length of time of meditation. It is only essential to set aside all involvements and sit quietly for a while. Eventually you will obtain absorbption, and not become oblivious, or sleepy.