Visual Splitting in Meditation

this can be used as a focal object in visual splitting

Visual splitting is an enhancement that can be used with many meditation methods (rather than a meditation technique in and of itself). This might seem like an odd place to begin this blog, rather than starting with a basic method for beginners, but I’ve been a little slow at getting going on it so I decided to go with whatever energy moves me when I sit down to write. I intend to post one item about meditation each week.

The overall idea with visual splitting is that if you have one or more “markers” that tell you when you’re maintaining your meditative focus and when you’re not, then it’s easier for you to maintain that focus. This (and other such markers) is something you can do with any meditation that involves maintaining awareness of your breathing – especially any kind of breath-counting or any mantra meditation that includes breath awareness.

I wrote this last week just after a morning meditation that included visual splitting. I was sitting on the balcony where we were spending a few days near Anaconda, Montana. Beneath the balcony is a stretch of well-watered common-space backyard lawn and beyond it several one-story houses just a few years old. Visible above their very new-looking gray roofs, about half a mile away a range of medium-height green hills rises up to meet the sky which was light morning blue with streaks of wispy clouds. The hills are covered with a mixture of dark green trees and bright green grass. Hidden behind them, invisible from where I sat, are high peaks of the continental divide, still covered with snow on that early June day.

My basic meditation practice that morning was a breath-counting method derived from Kriya yoga. My attention wanders easily. To counter that I like to add one or more extra elements to maintain focus. I often use visual splitting because it makes it quite obvious when my attention has drifted. Even when I want to let it drift and see where what comes to mind I like to begin with a few minutes of concentrative focus. Visual splitting helps with all of that. I choose a visually distinctive object at least six feet in front of me if it’s small, such as a candle or flower, and as much as a few hundred feet away if it’s large—such as a tree or telephone pole.

That morning I chose a sort of square box attached to the gray wall that faced me on a house about a hundred feet away. Here’s the method: As I inhale, I unfocus my eyes so that the object divides in two and then the two objects grow wider apart as I continue to breathe in. When I’ve inhaled fully, the now-distinct two visual images of the object are as far apart as my unfocused eyes can move them and hold them. Then as I exhale, I gradually let my eyes move back to refocus and as I do the two images of the object come closer together. When I’ve exhaled fully my eyes are completely focused and I’m looking at a single sharp image – i.e. the object as it “really is.”

With the next breath I repeat the process, the object splitting in two and the two images moving apart as I inhale, then moving back together to become a single object as I exhale. And so on with every succeeding breath for the entire meditation. That morning I began with the gray box on the wall, and as the meditation proceeded I found that a white stripe along the bottom edge of the roof also began to split in two and move along with the boxes. Ah, an exciting added attraction!

At some point when using this technique I usually find that the object is no longer splitting into two images but during the whole cycle of breath I’m just watching the one image. That’s a signal that I’ve lost my concentrative focus! My attention has drifted into some kind of rumination on this or that or the other thing. Then I notice where my mind has traveled and ask myself whether it’s something I need or want to think further about. If so I make a mental note to use it as the basis for a contemplative meditation at the end of this session or to think about it later in another way. For years I used to keep a notepad and pen by me during meditation because I often forgot those important moments of insight. Now I less often need the notepad. But if my mind has drifted somewhere of no great importance (as is most often the case) then I simply bring it back to the visual splitting. Inhale-the images move apart. . . exhale, they come back together. . . and so on for the entire meditative session.

Try it now. . .

Maybe you just tried it and it didn’t work. The object you chose stubbornly refused to separate into two images. Fortunately it’s not too hard to learn to do it. Here’s how:

Touch your nose with your finger. Look intently at that finger. Gradually move it away from you until it’s about a foot and a half from your nose. What happens? Probably you get a really good look at your finger. No big deal, right?

Let’s do it again. This time, keep your visual focus tightly on the tip of your nose. Move that finger out as before, but look at your nose rather than your finger. The finger is just an object in the background. You don’t care what it looks like but you really want to see every detail, every spot, every flickering of light and shadow, on your nose. Keep that nose in total focus. As you do, you’ll find that when your finger gets to be about six inches from your face there will be two of them. As you move your hand farther away the two fingers will move farther apart, so that when your hand is about a foot from your eyes your two fingers will be something like three inches apart. But keep looking at your nose with the fingers just a secondary image in the background. When you’ve extended your arm as far as you can, the two fingers will be from four inches to a foot apart. SUCCESS!

Then keep looking at your nose and gradually bring your hand back toward you. Somewhere out beyond your nose you’ll see your fingers gradually moving together. By the time you touch your nose you’ll see just one finger.

You might have to try this on three or four separate occasions before you finally succeed. That’s okay. Eventually you’ll get it.

Once you can do it, pair the movement of your hand with your breath. Move your hand away from your nose and watch your finger become two and the distance between them widen as you breathe in. Then watch the two fingers come together and the distance shrink as they come together as you breathe out.

Got that down? Now set a flower, a bottle, a Mickey Mouse Club button or whatever else is at hand about a foot in front of you so that you’re looking straight ahead or slightly downward at it. Breathe in and make it separate into two images that move apart. Breathe out and let them come together. Do that for at least five minutes. (You can even use the picture of the candle that goes with this blog. Enlarge it on your screen and set it about three feet away from you.)

If you have trouble doing that, go back to the nose-and-finger method. Once you’re again successful with that, repeat the process in the paragraph just above. This time use your finger just like above and keep your focus on your nose if you need to and also be peripherally aware of your chosen object out beyond your finger. You’ll notice that the image(s) of the object (which you’re not focusing on because you’re looking at the tip of your nose) is moving just like the twin images of your fingers. Then keep breathing and looking at your nose and drop your hand so that your finger is no longer in the picture and you’re just noticing your chosen object’s image(s) move apart and together.

Once you can do that, choose a visually distinct object on the other side of the room and do the same thing. Then go outdoors and try it with a large object in the distance.

You can use this as an enhancement with any breathing practice that involves normal or deep slow breathing. (It’s no good with fast breathing techniques.) If you’ve already started your meditation session and you find yourself in monkey mind or drifting mind, you can add visual splitting right there in the middle of your session and it will probably help you focus.