To the judgemental eye, everything is closed in definitive frames. When the judgemental eye looks out, it sees things in terms of lines and squares. It is always excluding and separating, and therefore it never sees in a compassionate or celebratory way. To see is to judge. Sadly the judgemental eye is always equally harsh with itself. It only sees the images of its tormented interiority projected outwards from itself. The judgemental eye harvests the reflective surface and calls it truth. It enjoys neither the forgiveness nor the imagination to see deeper into the ground of things where truth is paradox. (..)
To the inferior eye, everyone else is greater; others are more beautiful, brilliant or gifted than you. The inferior eye is always looking away from its own treasures. It can never celebrate its own presence and potential. The inferior eye is blind to its secret beauty.
The human eye was never designed to look up in a way that inflates the Other to superiority, nor to look down, reducing the Other to inferiority. To look someone in the eye is a nice testament to truth, courage and expectation. Each one stands on common, but different, ground.
To the loving eye, everything is real. This art of love is neither sentimental nor naive. Such love is the greatest criterion of truth, celebration and reality. Kathleen Raine, the Scottish poet, says that unless you see a thing in the light of love, you do not see it at all. Love is the light in which we see light. Love is the light in which we see each thing in its true origin, nature and destiny. If we could look at the world in a loving way, then the world would rise up before us full of invitation, possibility and depth.
The loving eye can even coax pain, hurt and violence towards transfiguration and renewal.
The loving eye is bright because it is autonomous and free. It can look lovingly upon anything. The loving eye does not become entangled in the agenda of power, seduction, opposition or complicity. Such vision is creative and subversive. It rises above the pathetic arithmetic of blame and judgement and engages experience at the level of its origin, structure and destiny. The loving eye sees through and beyond image and affects the deepest change. Vision is central to your presence and creativity. To recognize how you see things can bring you self-knowledge and enable you to glimpse the treasures your life secretly holds.
John O'Donohue - "Anam Cara"
