Anyone who has probed the inner life, who has sat in silence long enough to experience the stillness of the mind behind its apparent noise is faced with a mystery. Apart from all the outer attractions of life in the world, there exists at the center of human consciousness something quite satisfying and beautiful in itself, a beauty without features. The mystery is not so much that these two dimensions exist – an outer world and the mystery of the inner world – but that we are suspended between them, as a space in which both worlds meet ... as if the human being is the meeting point, the threshold between two worlds.
The overwhelming experience of fly fishing is Mystery. It deals with the Unseen, with what lies in the invisible dimensions beneath the shimmering, rippling surface of an ever-changing mountain stream. It exercises every ounce of imagination and can bypass conscious awareness for extended periods. Fly fishing is an open doorway into the unconscious. After all, one is often standing waist-deep in water, which is a mighty symbol of the unconscious mind. There is no way to rush this process: One must STAND in the Mystery. ... In order to be a decent fly fisherman, on must BECOME the fish ... To enter Trout Mind means giving up the self. ... Landing a trout provides a great opportunity for nonattachment: thanking and blessing the fish, and releasing her.
