Balance Narrow Focus With Wide-Angle Viewing

Camera lenses can shift focus, showing objects in what might be called a tight shot, or go for a wide angle, expanding the scope. It may be worthwhile to compare these modes of visual perception to our ways of perceiving and processing life experiences.

A tight focus, mentally speaking, because of its restrictedness, often leads to fixation. At times, this would reflect striving towards too much perfection. Perfectionism is a narrow focus, unnatural because it eliminates the imperfection and messiness that is naturally woven into our lives. Japanese potters, aware of this, deliberately drop some uneven glaze after completing glazing a pot, seemingly sloppy but in fact intentional to avoid the rigidity of perfection. This renders the piece its signature aliveness.

A Zen story demonstrates this well. A junior monk was sent to sweep leaves in the garden. The abbot in-charge walking by noticed it was perfectly swept without a single leaf left. The young monk thought he would be pleased. However, the abbot stepped forward and gently shook the tree, which led to some leaves falling. Pleased, he turned to the junior monk and said, "Ah! Good cleaning," indicating it was unnatural, therefore narrow focus, to assume that a tree should not have some leaves under it.

This narrowness in the spiritual sense, reveals itself in the 'nothing but this'. Replacing the purnam, which is the wide angle, whole, with a restricted approach. This limiting viewing, which also distorts, becomes a fertile ground for fanaticism and fundamentalism, be it in family, tribe or a nation.

There is no harm in close or narrow viewing, required in many instances, but the point is to ask, "Am I also capable of shifting my lens?" Narrow focus needs to be balanced by the wide-angle viewing of ideas and belief systems.

One of the best cases is that of Jalaluddin Balkhi, known as Rumi . It is reported that whoever attended his talks came away with a deeper understanding of his own spiritual tradition. That happened through unifying effect of 'ekam sat', believing truth is one, though sages call it variously. This could not have happened if Rumi only propagated teachings of his own tradition. Although he was deeply anchored in Islam, his enlightenment or 'the maturity of his faith', as Father Orlando often referred to, made it possible to effortlessly make a shift and zoom out to wider realities, from uniqueness to commonality. Rumi's was a caravan inviting more travellers to come along on the path to universal connectivity. Narrow viewing is too sharply focused, while wide-angle looking, and its inclusive nature enlarge the context. This has a profound effect on one's way of perceiving life, it 'immunises' one against mental viruses of partial and narrow assumptions, convictions and certainties.

Another example is the case of a woman going to the Buddha with an aching heart, hoping for some relief from the death of a loved one. The Buddha sends her to collect some mustard seeds from those houses where there had been no experience of loss. Returning empty-handed, she realises that everyone had a sad tale to tell. This led to what the Buddha had intended - a shift from a narrow focus to a wider angle, and with that, she came to be spared from the 'Why me?' syndrome.

Wide-angle viewing avoids fixing others or converting them, it accepts other ways of being and acting.

Authored by: Homayun Taba