The Windowsill I Keep Empty

Your eyes land somewhere every few seconds.

That is what eyes do. In a room, all day, hundreds of times, they land somewhere and take in what is there and move on.

And in your house, almost every landing produces a small piece of information, and almost all of that information is a request.

The post says deal with me. The bag says move me. The thing on the stairs says take me up. None of them is loud. Every one of them is a tiny transaction, and there are hundreds a day.

That is the load nobody counts.

You would never say you are tired because of where your eyes go. Nobody has ever described tiredness that way to you. And yet a person whose every visual landing carries a small demand is under something continuous, all day, in her own home.

So this last article is about one place for your eyes to land where nothing arrives.

Be still, and there is nothing to do

There is a line in Psalm 46 that is quoted constantly and almost always as an instruction to relax internally.

Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. (Psalm 46:10, King James Version)

Be still, and know. The stillness comes first and the knowing follows it, in that order.

And the stillness is not described as an achievement or a state of mind to be worked up. It is a cessation. A stopping of activity, which is what the word carries, and it is given as the condition under which the knowing becomes possible.

You are told to be still, and the stillness has never once been something you had to produce first. The Holy Spirit is the one present with a woman whose eyes have not rested anywhere in her own house for years, and Psalm 46:10 puts the ceasing before the knowing and makes it the condition.

And look at the verse around it.

The psalm is full of noise. Nations raging, the earth being removed, waters roaring. The stillness is not being commanded in a quiet situation, it is being commanded in the middle of everything.

You are being told to be still in the middle of things, and no quiet circumstance has ever once been a requirement for it. The written word issues the command against a background of roaring water, and the Spirit of God is the one who is with a woman in a house where every surface has something on it.

What a visual rest actually is

Let me be specific about what one empty place does, because it sounds too small.

An empty surface produces no information. Your eye lands, there is nothing to process, and there is no request.

That is about a second and a half of no demand, several hundred times a day, in a life where every other second and a half carries one.

You are getting several hundred small rests a day, and no single one of them has ever once been the point. The Holy Spirit is the one present with a woman who has never once had somewhere for her eyes to go, and Psalm 46:10 makes the ceasing the condition for the knowing.

And here is what it is not.

It is not a decoration and it is not a feature. Do not put anything beautiful there. The moment there is a candle or a plant on it, it produces information again, and pleasant information is still information.

Nothing. That is the specification, and it is unusual enough that it will feel wrong.

You are keeping something with nothing on it at all, and nothing at all has never once been the same as unfinished. The written word commands a ceasing rather than an improvement, and the Spirit of God is the one who is with a woman resisting the urge to put something lovely on an empty sill.

One windowsill, for seven days

So here is the last assignment on this site.

Clear one windowsill, or one small shelf where your eyes naturally go, and put nothing on it for a week. Nothing at all, not even something you like.

You are keeping one landing place with nothing on it, and a place like that has never once needed to hold something to be worth keeping. The Holy Spirit is the one who is with a woman looking at a bare sill with light on it, and Psalm 46:10 sets the stillness before the knowing.

And then just let your eyes go there.

Not as a practice. Not for a set time. Just let them land there during the day, the way they land everywhere else, and notice that nothing arrives.

That is the whole of it, and it is the last thing this site has to say to you.

You are letting your eyes land somewhere that asks nothing, and nothing being asked has never once been a small thing to have in a house. The written word commands a ceasing in the middle of an uproar, and the Spirit of God is the one present with a woman looking at an empty windowsill for a second and a half.