“According to the perennial philosopy- the common mystical core of the world´s great spiritual traditions- men and women possess at least three different modes of knowing: the eyes of the flesh, which discloses the material, concrete and sensual world; the eye of the mind, which discloses the symbolic, conceptual, and linguistic world; and the eye of contemplation, which discloses the spiritual, transcendental, and transpersonal world. These are not the thee different aspect of our one world, disclosed by diffrent modes of knowing and perceiving”. – (Source: The Sacred Mirrors. The visionary Art of Alex Grey. In the in the prologue In the Eye of the Artist- Art and the Perennial Philosophy, by Ken Wilber. 1990).
Ken Wilber explains further more how these three ´eyes´ unfold in a developmental sequence from babies to adult. The first realm is composed by sensibilia, or phenomena that can ve perceived by the body. The second realm is composed by intelligiblilia, or objects perceived by the mind. The third realm is composed of transcendelia, or objects perceived by the soul or spirit. This is a process that goes, stage by stage, algong our pshysical, mental, emotional development along our life.
This doesn´t mean that the spiritual relam appears only when we are adults. This realm has always been there, actually, because it is our escence. But it is like somehow, it is latent, constantly sustaining the development as an invisible intelligence, not visible yet to the first two eyes. It comes a time, sooner or later, when we are ready and our spiritual eye opens its eyelids and begins to see new information.
It is common that long periods of our lifes we relate our experiencies with the first two realms, because in our daily life we operate mostly using the eyes of body and mind to understand the world. And we learn to identify ourselves with what we see from them.
It is when we suddenly feel stuck; or try to solve something for which we find no answer or solution according to the information we have received so far from our first two eyes; Or perhaps, a meaningless thing comes into life that invites us to look beyond; Or perhaps an experience that shakes us so strongly that what cracks we have learned so far; that the membranes between these three eyes begin to permeate, and the information of the transcendelia begins to become more visible.
Sometimes, since we were children or young, we have suspected that there is something more, a new way, something that we know but we don’t know how we know it. Something that is there and we have not dis-covered yet. We can sense it, perceive it, but not yet fully conscious. When we start having conscious connection with the eye of contemplation, we receive a more complete way of perceiving ourselves, a broader vision of reality, something more authentic that puts the experiences of the body and mind into perspective, allowing us to de-identify from them a little.
The third realm is awaiting to be touched, awaken, and used. I have always wish that, in a greater or lesser extent, my client´s developmental processes nourish the seed of this third realm and the interconnection of these three perspectives, because it is there where the greatest clarity of ourselves arises. And in a greater or lesser extent I take it into account in during the process.