The Sound Itself

Sit quietly, eyes closed. Choose one sound from your surroundings, the temple bell ringing for evening aarati, a koel calling from the neighbour's tree, the distant horn of a local train. Do not call it bell, bird, or train. Drop the names. Hold attention on the raw quality of the sound itself, its texture, its rise and fall. Words will keep returning, gently set them down again. After some time, the sound and the listening become one bare experience, with no thinker in between. That bareness is the practice.