THE “SCALA NATURAE” EXERCISE

The following instructions will introduce you to a purely natural and therapeutic askêsis.

Ancient Hellenistic philosophers had introduced a very interesting theory about nature inner levels
(scala naturae in latin) and divided the universe into four levels: hexis (stones), phusis (flowers, plants
trees), psuchê (animals) and finally nous (a characteristic belonging only to human beings). However,
human beings, the most complex creation of nature, are composed of all these four levels.

As individuals immerged day after days in contemporary buzzing industrial societies, we have often
lost contact with the nature’s natural elements, which go together to form our microcosm. This may
lead to all sorts of discomforts, emotional disturbances and sicknesses. The individual feels
unwelcome, estranged from the world. That is why this askesis, according to the ancients, has as its
first task, entering into contemplation and praise the entire universe.

Find an isolated peaceful place, where you are alone. You should feel good: it must be a place where
you will be not exposed to the others. A special place in your home or flat, specially dedicated to this
exercice, dark, with one single burning candle is usually considered as a useful help.

(1) The first instruction concerns stability (hexis):

The first counsel to give anyone who wants to meditate is not on the spiritual level, but on the physical.
Sit down. Sit down like a stone.

Sitting down like a stone means taking roots, putting on weight, going down. Meditation is finding out
your earth, your roots, being here with all your weight, immobile.

The best is to have your pelvis higher that your knees. That is why you will find useful to use a round,
thick enough, firm but not flabby cushion. This cushion will enable you, with crossed legs, to find a
stable and firm base during long period (a Buddhist zafu cushion will do well). Although this might be
difficult at the beginning, you should find a base and feel no pain.

The goal of settling into a good posture is threefold:

- It will procure you a stable sensation in your body and this will allow you to free your attention
from balance problems and muscular fatigue and to focus, to be centred.
- It will favour physical immobility which will be reflected by mind stability: the habits of the
body condition those of the mind
- It will enable you to remain sit during a long length of time without having to give way to the
meditator enemies: pain, muscular tensions and drowsiness.

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At another level meditating like a stone is also acquiring a sense of eternity. Nature lives with another
rhythm. You have eternity behind you and ahead of you. If you are well-centred, you have eternity
inside you.

(2) The second instruction concerns orientation (phusis):

Meditation is first of all a posture, but meditation is also orientation. The most important is to settle
down with a straight back. Your spine must be straight, with vertebras positioned as a pile of coins,
one above the other. Your head must be aligned with the rest of your spine.

All of this must be achieved in a relaxed way. No rigidity: there must not be muscular tensions
originating from the fact of keeping a straight back. You are not a soldier. Your spine should be like a
poppy with a straight stem and the rest of your body is simply hanged to your spine.

All of this will require experimentation. Generally, our body is full of tensions and defensive postures
when we walk or speak or find itself in indolent postures when we relax. None of them are good.

At another level, this meditation is also adopting a proper frame of mind, to orientate yourself toward
the good (to kalon). The observation of plants, flowers and trees teaches us that they are all fragile,
they blossom then fade. They give us a sense of time.

(3) The third instruction concerns sensation or aisthêsis (psuchê)

Askêsis is posture, orientation, but also sensation. The term aisthêsis describe the intelligent breathes
which carry information from your senses to your hegemonikon but in a more general way also mean
“apperception by mean of the senses”.

You are noticing the close affinity in stoic philosophy between your thoughts and your breathing. Thus
at this stage, you will learn to listen to be in tune with the subtle sensation of breathing, yet distinctive.

The first step in using breathing as object of askêsis is to find it. You are searching for the physical
tactile sensation of the air going back and forth through your nostrils. Generally, you can find it just at
the cutting edge of your nose. However, the precise location varies from one person to another.

To find your own point, take a deep quick breath and notice where the sensation is located. Now,
expire and note the sensation in the very same place. This place will become you focus point in
observing the inspiration and expirations natural waves.

You must not try to control your breathing: this is not a breathing exercise. Your breathing must remain
spontaneous and natural, not amplified or adjusted: let the process ‘be’ according to its own rhythm.

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Inhale and exhale during a few minutes until you think that you have succeeded in maintaining a
certain concentration during a few minutes.

Now observe what is going on in your mind.

(4) The fourth instruction concerns the logos (nous):

Imagine that your mind is like a vessel filled with water. Phantasiai (impressions) are like a ray of light
that falls upon the water. If the water is disturbed, the ray will seem to be disturbed likewise, though
in reality it is not.

The impact of the deep concentration is to slow down the mental process, thus making your mind like
a vessel filled with still water and strengthening your observing consciousness. You will gain a greater
capacity in examining the thought mechanism.

In the silent observation of breathing, there are two things to avoid: thinking and drowsiness.

There is a difference between being aware of a thought and thinking a thought. This is a very subtle
difference which is well expressed in terms of sensation or texture. A thought you are simply attentive
to is felt as being very light in its texture. There is a feeling of distance between this thought and the
consciousness which perceive it. It appears and disappears without necessarily give birth to the next
thought.

The normal conscious thought is of a much heavier texture: it aspires you and takes control of your
consciousness. By its very nature, it is obsessional and directly conducts to the next thought in the
chain and it usually take the form of:

(1) all that others do or say

(2) all that you yourself have done or said
(3) all that troubles you with regard to the future
(4) all that belonging to the body which envelops you and the breath conjoined with it
(5) all that is the vortex whirling around outside you sweeps in its wake, so that the power of your
mind

You will soon realise that your mind will constantly try to escape, to go in every directions. Do not
worry, this phenomenon is well known and every prokopton has to overcome it. When this happens,
simply note that you were thinking or dreaming and go back to the observation of your breathing with
the help of your focus point, without judging yourself.

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Drowsiness is almost the contrary: it denotes a loosening of the attention. It is a hole, an emptiness, a
grey mental zone. Avoid it. This askêsis is here to help you to develop a strong and energetic
concentration, a clear and distinct vigilance, focused on one single point. If you realise that you are
drowsy, simply note it and go back to the observation of your breathing.

The essence of this askêsis is learning to “put away from yourself” these always and extremely agitated
ordinary thoughts and be able to remain in a state of listening, of openness in every circumstances.
You will soon realise that a phantasia may it be a thought, a physical sensation or an outside noise,
rises then disappears and that you have no need to get involved into it. If you are able of maintaining
this observing consciousness for a while, you may succeed in making yourself ‘a well rounded sphere
rejoicing in the solitude around it’ that is the very famous Empedocles’ Sphairos.

The Sphairos is a powerful image, profoundly Hellenistic. Understanding what the Sphairos is will
require from you to get rid of your natural tendency to geometric and spatial vision. Roundness is a
metaphor for perfection: for ancient Greeks, the sphere is an expression of the divine for it has neither
beginning nor end and can be travelled infinitively. It expresses the most beautiful, the most sublime,
the most accomplished and this accomplishment is the kosmos itself, everlasting and flourishing. The
solitude reflects the unicity of the kosmos: there is only one universe, and this universe is the whole
(to pan). The kosmos is solitude and perfection.

Retired in your dwelling of knowledge, you give yourself over to the mindful perception. This askêsis
is about listening and contemplation, which implies the absence of direction, thus abandoning your
‘human all too human’ self-centred point of view. An oriented listening, to the contrary, is a listening
of the known, of the ordinary though, of memory, of habit, of all of our packet of memories or scar
tissues.

Nothing belongs to us, but everything belongs to Nature, to the logos. Genuine eternity is not a
determination of time but mindfulness, the nous realising by itself the perfection of sphairos.

The sphairos is the sage.