A story is told about the Greek philosopher Plato and Diogenes the Cynic. One day Diogenes visited Plato. When he came into the room he saw the table covered with a rich cloth, shelves glittering with silver cups and other vessels, and other sumptuous furniture. He took hold of the cloth with force, dragged it onto the floor, and stamped upon it with his feet, saying, “I tread upon Plato’s pride”. Plato quietly answered: “And with greater pride!”Of such stories our lives are made up — stories about ourselves and others, some true to fact and others fanciful. True or fanciful, it is the richness of the stories that makes the richness of our lives and it is the richness of our mental power that makes the richness of the stories. Fact and environment give opportunity, but living has strength, color and richness only on account of what it brings to opportunity. Therefore better than to seek opportunity is to be prepared for it.

It is richness that I am emphasizing now. Our life depends on richness of mind. The natural is the rich, and can always teach us. I can ask myself now whether I have truly tasted the richness of a yellow envelope — a common thing — which lies upon my table and catches my eye as I write these words. I look at the envelope because of this question. I close my eyes and think of the color of that thing. I open them again and see the richness of that yellow color better than before. It feeds my mind; I feel a new delight and enhancement of life — the immediate result of this small but fruitful act, and I acknowledge with thanks the beloved companionship of that common yellow thing.

This is to preface a piece of advice regarding the practice of concentration. Let your mental images be rich and strong, and you will be happy, whatever they are. To be rich and strong they must be natural.

First, in their setting and position. I will imagine a silver cup standing on Plato’s table. I come into the room, like Diogenes, but in a better mood. I rest myself on one of Plato’s seats. I say to myself, “The silver cup”. It is standing on the table — that is the first point of naturalness. It is not floating in the air. Although I shall very soon forget the table in my more absorbed attention to the cup, it is present at the back of my consciousness and makes its unseen contribution to my present experience, which would be far poorer without it.

Second, as to its size, shape and color. These are things in the realm of sight. I do not say I will see the cup. That is not intimate enough — there is too much I in it. Rather I will be the seeing of the cup. That is a mind-reality in nature — the seeing of the cup. Why should I thin out that seeing by diluting it with another picture — a picture of “I”? Let me be the seeing, and that “I” will also fade like the table, and become seeing itself for the time being. Try this, and you will discover the joy of it. Try it with the first thing that catches your eye, and let your seeing have size, form and color.

Thirdly; bring in the other senses. You may try this, now, with your book. You have been holding it without feeling it. But now close your eyes, put your consciousness into your finger-tips and run them over the book, may I say caressingly ? Feel the texture of cloth and paper. Why, you can feel the ink on the paper. And feel the edgeness of the edges, and the cornerness of the corners, and the flatness of the flat parts. And it smells — did you know that? The ink smells, and the paper smells, and the glue and string and cloth. The book has weight too — did you notice that? And when you touch it there is some sound — its own sound, not the sound you would get from touching Plato’s silver cup.

Plato’s silver cup! Yes, I will be touching to feel it; and smelling and hearing. It lives for that and calls me as the flower calls to the bee, and fulfils some of its purpose in our moment’s union of living. So natural and so intimate should be your concentration.

I will think now of Diogenes pulling the cloth off the table. He moves. In concentration the stillness of still things must be a positive stillness, as though eternity itself were embodied in them, and the moving of moving thing must be natural, like flags waving in the breeze, or. persons dancing on the village green, or Diogenes pulling the cloth. We are not concentrating on pictures of things, but on the things themselves. If necessary, ask yourself a series of questions about the object of concentration — as to position, size, shape, color, texture and all the rest.

close my eyes, cynic, diogenes, enhancement, greek philosopher plato, pride