Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha: An Unusually Hardcore Dharma Book

by Daniel M. Ingram

Stare at the kasina with relaxed eyes and facial muscles until you feel a shift in which the color starts to bleed around the edges of the kasina if you shift your eyes, or when you notice some visual distortion. This might take from thirty seconds to a minute or two. Then close your eyes and fix on the visual purple after-image (a general term, which doesn't imply the image will necessarily be purple, but that it will be the complementary color of the object which, if the object is yellow, will be purple), and pay attention to this to the exclusion of everything else, if possible. So, if the external kasina object is bright, the initial visual purple after-image will be dark, and if the kasina is dark, the after-image will be light. The visual purple image may wander, spin off to the side, morph, flicker, or fade, but don't worry about that initially, just keep your attention on it, tracking exactly what it does with a high degree of interest in the fine specifics of every little movement, change, and wiggle.