Who are you? What are you?
These are some of the deepest questions we can ask.
I came across some novel ways of answering these questions while listening to some ‘pointing out’ experiments by Richard Laing from The Headless Way.
These experiments offer some intriguing, visual ways of discovering that awareness is our experience. Or as Richard puts it: when we look to find out who we are we discover that at centre we have no head. We are simply space for the world
As I listened to Richard’s talks, it was a lovely surprise to discover that the ‘pointing out’ experiments came from the work of Douglas Harding, a twentieth century pioneer who lived in Nacton, near Ipswich and who was born in Lowestoft.
And yet he is little known locally.
I live near Ipswich, so I got in touch with Richard Laing and he put me in touch with Bill Garside who lives in the town. Bill spent many years with Douglas, travelling the world and sharing these practices.
When I met Bill we hit it off straight away. We both share a deep love of life and found ourselves laughing at the mystery and absurdity of it all. Over the last couple of years we have struck up a friendship, and Bill has helped me explore the questions of who I am and what I am.
What I have found by way of answers, experiences and further questions has been curious, funny, remarkable, energising and precious to me.
In the summer of 2024 I got a few people together for a workshop with Bill in a groovy yurt provided by my friend John Millar from The Qigong Academy. It was a super fun session and we played with ‘The science of the 1st person’ as Douglas Harding called it, using our direct experience for self-enquiry without any dogma.
If that all sounds a bit serious, it really wasn’t. We did experiments in looking for our heads (no one could find their own without a mirror) and looking through large tubes where someone else’s head took up the whole field of view and conscious experience.