SONG — “The Terrain”
Naomi was sitting on the back step just before dusk.
Nothing special had happened.
That was the point.
The air was cooling. A bird clicked somewhere in the hedge. Her tea had gone untouched long enough to taste faintly metallic.
A thought floated up, familiar and competent:
I should be present.
She smiled at it and let it pass.
Because presence wasn’t something to do.
It was already leaking through everything.
She noticed first the body — not as an object, but as weather:
a slow warmth behind the sternum,
a dense softness in the belly,
a faint fizz along the forearms,
breath moving like an unannounced guest.
No labels arrived at first.
Then the mind tried, late and clumsy:
This is calm.
This is awareness.
This is good.
Each word landed like a lid.
She felt it immediately — the way naming flattened the living texture into something manageable, ownable, small.
So she stopped naming.
What remained wasn’t mystical.
It was thick.
Experience without commentary had a depth she’d never noticed — layers folding into layers, sensation braided with mood, mood braided with space.
The world wasn’t out there anymore.
And she wasn’t in here.
There was just… happening.
Not as a noun.
As a verb.
She realised then that most of her life had been spent relating to maps — thoughts about experience — while the terrain had been humming underneath the whole time.
No wonder it felt distant.
No wonder it felt thin.
The heart didn’t think this.
The body didn’t conclude it.
It was discovered the way you discover warmth when you step into sunlight —
by being touched.
INVESTIGATION — “Map vs. Terrain”
This is not an intellectual inquiry.
It’s a felt investigation.
Move slowly.
1. Notice how thought abstracts
Right now, notice any sensation in the body.
Then notice the word that appears for it:
tension
calm
anxiety
openness
See how fast the word arrives.
That word is the map.
Ask gently:
What is here before the word?
Stay there.
2. Shift from thinking about to feeling into
Instead of asking “What is this?”
ask:
What does this feel like from the inside?
Not meaning.
Not story.
Texture.
Temperature.
Movement.
Density.
Let sensation answer in its own language.
3. Discover the depth beneath description
As you stay with raw sensation, notice:
it’s not static
it’s not singular
it has layers
it shifts without asking
Thought describes snapshots.
Experience is continuous flow.
Ask:
How deep does this go?
Don’t answer.
Feel.
4. Notice the difference between heart and head
The head:
categorises
explains
evaluates
The heart/body:
registers
resonates
responds
Ask:
Which one knows this moment more intimately?
You’ll feel the answer.
5. The pivotal recognition
Thinking is about experience.
Feeling is experience.
The map is useful — but it is never the terrain.
When attention sinks into the body, something quiet but vast reveals itself:
a wordless intimacy with being alive.
Not describable.
But unmistakable.