Francis Answers - 206 - On focusing on the Heart

Francis Lucille

Name: ganesh

Location: holland, alkmaar (near amsterdam)

Dear Francis, I have a question about meditation. In your book ‘the perfume of silence’ you write: “Don’t let your mind rest upon any object. In this sense, meditation requires a kind of vigilance. The only place to rest is the Self. When we create a sensation in the body to rest on, we create a pseudo self, a pseudo ‘me’.” In my experience there is often a comfortable, burning sensation in the area of/near my heart. Almost naturally the attention is drawn there; then there is peace, the attention doesn’t go to thinking. (And still something is aware of the sensation in the chest.) I ‘use’ this sensation often as a guide ‘t o turn within’. Like the mind rests in the Heart. But still it is a bodily sensation. As I read your book, I think that I maybe miss the point. That my way is not ‘the way’ to rest in the Self’. Could you please comment on this? with love of Ganesh (I was several times at your satsang in Amsterdam and I am very happy with your explanations on the internet and reading your books)

Dear Ganesh,

A sensation in the chest is still a sensation, an object, and not the experience of our true nature, consciousness. However the peace, intimacy, joy, happiness, love that may accompany this sensation is the experience of our true nature filtered by the presence of object, just as the light we perceive through a semi-transparent curtain is the light of the sun filtered by the threads of the fabric. The darker the threads and the higher the thread count, the less intense is the light that comes through. The darker and denser the thoughts, the lesser the peace and happiness.

Stick to the peace, not to the chest feeling.