Contemplation spreads like a quiet pond in the soul and draws into the quiet innermost soul1 that attentively and patiently awaits.
Alone, one cannot produce anything. Trust is the sure footing on the path through this world. Our way through this world is a reaching through many veils. We anticipate the next steps without knowing what the world will look like once we have taken them—we sense our way along the path. Cautiously, we remove the next veil that arises before us, stepping behind a curtain as if we were slowly diving through water. We push aside the thin cloth like a diver pushing aside water in order to continue moving onward.
Underwater, many things are hidden from the diver. They do not see as clearly or hear as distinctly as in the open air. They dive, dive, and sense their way forward through semi-transparent water. So do we sense our way forward through this world. We see as the diver sees—we do not see the whole path upon which we are walking, as the diver only partly sees through water.
The diver grabs a rope and pulls themselves through the water until they reach an anchor to which it is tied. What is beyond the anchor, they can only surmise; onward, they get caught in a stream that carries them along. They turn, look up and down as the flow carries them on. It flows into deep, dark water, and the diver swims slowly forward, pushing water aside and leaving it behind until, as the water becomes shallower, they see sand below, getting closer and closer. On their knees, they feel their way forward and reach through the last veil, through the water’s surface—they have reached a beach.
The waves crash behind them; the diver is wet and breathing as if newly born. All their life, they’ve only known water and reaching through water. Their path has suddenly changed shape—the diver has become a hiker. They walk for the first time, reaching through the veil of air. Every step is new—they step on solid ground, on sand, on earth. The veil of the wind is thin; the hiker’s arms reach almost imperceptibly through it, as it gently caresses the skin between their fingers like a light cloth.
The hiker moves in the wind, anticipating their way forward faster than when they were still diving through water. The hiker lifts the veils of wind and air that hang from the sky and through which they must anticipate—lifts them in their own way, as they could be lifted in so many other ways. The hiker wanders through the veils of the wind, which settle upon the world again once the hiker has passed. After many guesses and directions, an unknown place spreads out before them. They sense that their steps will soon run out, sense with the wafting wind that they will not be a hiker much longer. Only a few steps remain before the ground stops and turns into air. Over the cliff they go with their last step—it begins on the ground and continues in the air. The hiker senses that they have ceased to be a hiker—they sense a new shape rising within themselves. They see a path in a vast expanse of light and patiently spread out their arms, which become white feathers. Invisible wings carry them away, far over all the mountains, clouds, and stars. Home.
Andreas Blaser, M.A. researched contemplation as part of a scholarship from the Anthroposophical Society of Germany. This has resulted in texts that are themselves contemplative. We will be publishing contributions from his collection from time to time over the next six months. His article “View of Humankind” was published on June 21, 2024. He currently lives and works in Basel.
Translation Joshua Kelberman
Image Cornelia Friedrich, Begegnung mit dem Licht [Encounter with the light], 2012
Footnotes
- The German word is Gemüt, a word without a direct correlate in English. Sometimes translated as “mind,” “higher soul,” “inner moral tenor,” or descriptively, in one sense, as the faculty of the soul where the unity of soul activity and transcendence of the soul are simultaneously experienced. I have chosen “innermost soul” here to allow the style and tone of the writing to carry through as much as the meaning—Trans. note.
