I'm writing this in response to a bike ride in the country a few days ago. I noticed that the things for which I knew no name - the nameless - evoked the deepest sense of beauty. For me, the lack of names helps impart a more profound sense of mystery (regardless of what the thing is). Once a 'thing' is labeled, it easily loses its mystery - its mysterious sameness. Well, of course, it doesn't lose anything; rather, my awareness does.

It is because the way conceals itself in being nameless that we didn't name our two sons for a year after they were born. I suppose folks rush to name their kids mostly out of convention,... still, what a pity in my admittedly 'un-normal' view.

Doesn't art, like the philosophical words I write (ops, murder the mystery? Murder? Ouch! Okay instead, let's just say extinguish, or at least obfuscate, the mystery. We have difficulty in letting mystery remain. As soon as we notice an unknown 'it', we name 'it' (be-hold 'it', define 'it', create 'it', form 'it', own 'it', etc.) and in this process 'know it'. In 'knowing it', we demystify 'it' and thereby block the gateway of the manifold secrets. That's ironic, eh? Well, sure,... whoever does anything to it will ruin it; whoever lays hold of it will lose it.

The view that 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder' goes back to ancient Greece and to Buddha's teaching. Perhaps Alexander the Great brought it back with him from India. I imagine this idea is commonly interpreted similar our sense of taste, For example, 'delicious is in the taste of the chewer'. You like vanilla, I like chocolate.

However, there is a mysterious side to this when I think of 'my mind as the beholder'. What I see 'out there' is simply a reflection of my mind's depth of perception. So I'd say, more than being in the eye of the beholder, beauty is truly in the nameless eye of the beholder. When I do my utmost to attain emptiness and hold firmly to stillness, my mind can let go of its words and names. Only then can I see beauty – impartial and true. In the mystery of sameness, vanilla becomes chocolate becomes vanilla becomes...darkly visible, it only seems as if it were there.

Well, I’ve murdered the mystery enough. Time to return and hold fast to the void,... for a while. Although the distinctions are fading, even in this. It is about time too!