The Shimmer of Salt: A Tibetan Mosaic of Light and Nature Meditation

Far above the clouds, Tibet is home to some of the highest salt fields in the world. Flat, sun-baked stretches of shimmering white crystals that reflect the light like fragments of diamond-charged wild magic. Glossy, prism-like nuggets of brightness and illumination, each one formed over hundreds of years.

Salt Wisdom

Salt is not just a commodity but a sacred medicine for the Tibetan people who call the high plateau home. In Markam County, in the Yanjing and Quzika townships, locals there have been making salt for over 1,300 years. Generations of salt workers have led saline water into these shallow salt fields and slowly tended to it under the sun until what remains is only salt.

This ancient practice of salt-making is one of the few remaining places on the planet where truly primitive, hand-dried methods are still being employed and honored. It is no technological advancement or shallow lore. This is the human grit and endurance of ancestors who worked hand-in-hand with the elements, grateful to coax gifts from the earth and sky.

What would become not only a vital source of sustenance but a living testament to what can be created with hard work, attention, and reverence.

Crystals in the Heart Nature Meditation

We, too, have salt pools within us; we can visualize how the water can become our own swirling energies, emotions, distractions, and fears. These pools allow us to let in the sun of awareness, mindfulness, curiosity, and presence. And over time, without anything forced or rushed, and slowly, the extraneous evaporates. Old stories, sharp edges, tension, and perceived limits.

What remains is salt: crystals of clarity, compassion, resilience, and authenticity. And when the water lingers? Mirrors. At different times of the day and with different angles of the sun, the fields turn pink, sapphire, ivory, and amber. The salt pans become a giant kaleidoscope strewn across the vast Tibetan plateau.

Salt and Sky Reflected

The salt and sky in the Tibetan salt fields are reflected like mirrors. Each shallow basin catches the water and light differently. A kaleidoscope of color, shattered into shards by salt and sky. In these moments, we can pause, take a breath, and step back. Watch the whole landscape transform into a giant patchwork quilt stitched with light and color.

Isn’t this true of us as well? Each one of us is made up of a particular shade and color. We are a personal lightness of being and a unique way of being brilliant. And when we gather all of our colors together, all the deep blues of introspection and reflection, the fiery golds of bold action, and the soft pinks of vulnerability and tenderness. Our inner mosaics leave us awe-struck.

Nature Knows No Rush

As Lao Tzu once said,

---

"Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished."

---

In the salt fields, as in our own inner fields, there is no longer any rush. When we meet life with reverence, we simply show up to our own inner nature meditation. With our own ancient tools—body, breath, and awareness—we sit long enough to notice what we love, what we do not, and what shines so brightly it steals your breath. In that spaciousness, you can even see what has settled so deep it cannot be seen.

Tending with Reverence

Tending to salt pans is not a battle. It’s not a fight, or a conquest, or even a practice to master. It’s a simple and sacred act of reverence. Day after day those salt caretakers show up with tools weathered by time, with skin bronzed by sun, and with deep appreciation for small miracles: a salt pan that shimmers, a harvest that will last all year, and the shifting of color that makes them pause in wonder.

The salt workers know that the beauty of it all is not in force but in presence; they return day after day with nothing to prove and nothing to gain.

We, too, can tend our own inner ground with spunky fearlessness: wake up early and tend. Enjoy nature, move to energize, still the body and mind with the breath, settle in, and watch our inner surface for a while. Watch the water, your swirling heart. Notice what shimmers and notice what is evaporating. Let your light illuminate that which is luminous and essential.

Radiant After the Sun Sets

And even as the sun sets, we can notice there is something holy in what remains after the sun has done its work, after the wind has blown its passage through, and after the shadows of the passing have settled and become solid. All that is left is salt: steadfast, pure, and sustaining. And in what remains is the luminance of many years, of many lives, of many moments when someone paid attention.

But we can also notice there is something holy in the water before the salt appears. Before the sun has had its way. Before what is solid has settled and been bejeweled with the light of the sky. The waters are filled with sky, mirror and refract, shimmer and change with the day. There is something about the shimmering impermanence of the water that is as radiant and awakening as the clear salt that settles out of it.

As you sit, as you walk in nature, as you trail run, as you do yoga, and as you rest in your quiet curiosity, something within you crystallizes. Something within you awakens. Not because it was forced but because it was observed.

Reflection and Awakening

In the salt fields in Tibet, the earth and the sky meet, reflecting one another. In our own inner life, awareness and earthiness meet, reflecting one another. And in that meeting, if we tend to it with wild curiosity, with spunky boldness and care, and return again and again with presence, our own inner illumination will find us and make us shine.

Keep returning to our inner fields. Tend with wild reverence, let in the sky, let in the water. Show up and be with yourself long enough to notice what is beautiful and essential and allow what wants to grow in you to thrive and flourish.

Cheers!

Kether

Spunky Mind

 “Sitting quietly, doing nothing, spring comes,

 and the grass grows by itself.”

-Basho

Let the ancient salt fields spark your own

motivation and dive into your inner terrain.

The place where what remains after all

evaporation is what really matters.

Free Field Notes:

Shimmers of Salt—Download