Face to No-Face

This experiment looks into your fundamental relationship with others. Are you face to face with others and therefore distant and separate from them? Or are you face there to no face here and therefore not separate or distant? Do you confront others or are you capacity for them?

The Tube experiment is a powerful exploration of this important question. If you don’t have a tube you can either make one (it’s easy to do) or you can do the experiment without one – simply sit opposite a friend and look at each other, changing the questions slightly to fit this situation. You can also do this experiment looking at your face in the mirror – with or without a tube.

To make a tube, cut the end off a paper bag or get a large piece of paper and tape the ends together – it must be large enough to fit a face in each end. Sit opposite a friend. One of you can read the questions out loud – briefly come out of the tube to do so. Or better, get a third person to read the questions to you.

Put your face in one end of the tube whilst your friend puts his or her face in the other end. Answer (silently to yourself or out loud to your partner) the following questions:

• On present evidence, how many faces do you see in the tube, two or one?
• You can see your friend’s face at the far end – do you see your face at the near end?
• Isn’t your end wide-open? Doesn’t the tube vanish into nothingness at your end – into clear, boundless consciousness?
• How many clear, boundless consciousnesses do you see in the tube, two or one?
• Is this single, undivided consciousness at the near end separate from the face at the far end? Is there a dividing line between this space and that face?
• As this space, aren’t you built open for your friend, face there to no face here?
• Having no face of your own, couldn’t you say that your friend’s face is yours?
• Haven’t you always been face to no-face with others?

Come out of the tube.

Take a few moments to share your reactions with your friend.