My words are words of a questioning, and to indicate reality;
This printed and bound book.... but the printer and the printing-office boy?
The marriage estate and settlement.... but the body and mind of the bridegroom? also those of the bride?
The panorama of the sea.... but the sea itself?
The well-taken photographs... but your wife or friend close and solid in your arms?
The fleet of ships of the line and all the modern improvements.... but the craft and pluck of the admiral?
The sky up there.... yet here or next door or across the way?
The saints and sages of history.... but you yourself?
Sermons and creeds and theology.... but the human brain, and what is called reason, and what is called love, and what is called life?
Whitman, Song of Myself (1082-1091)
---------------------------
How is it that a child can flail and scream about something insignificant, and the parents can easily ignore the tantrum, but Mahatma Gandhi can silently refuse food and bring a nation to a halt? How does the placation, "Friends, Romans, Countrymen lend me your ears...." bring about a riot? How do the actions of a small band of soldiers in Thermopylae resound through history?
I saw a performance of So You Think You Can Dance live a few months ago. I was struck by one dancer - a club dancer named Russell. His movements burst forth so that he was all I could see. There were some technical aspects to this phenomenon. His body works well; the parts are integrated, making each movement look fuller. But I have been just as captivated by dancers whose bodies move around the stage like a sack of potatoes. The technical can't explain everything, however I will speak about the technical aspects of integration, trying to get to a deeper meaning.
When the integrated body reaches outwards, the limbs reach to the fullest extent that the body is capable of reaching. The non-integrated body tends to try to reach a little farther, and this is done at the expense of some other part. For instance, when the arm extends forward, an integrated movement would look exactly like you expect. The non-integrated movement would "collapse" or further extend the shoulder, so that it seems to protrude from the natural lie of the body.
Furthermore, in the integrated body, movement flows from the center outwards. I saw a beautiful example of this is Ted Shawn's Death of Adonis. I wish I had a youtube clip to share, but it was off a DVD. His arms were fully extended in 2nd position. He turned his arms and hands upwards to the sky, and you could watch the movement originate in the back and shoulder blades, ripple upwards through the arms, and finally, exultantly, reach the wrists and hands. It gives me chills.
In a still, integrated body, the lines of gravity flow efficiently through the center of gravity and downwards into the earth. This body can relax in a neutral position. The fully relaxed and centered person can move the quickest. Their muscles simply need to fire, and this will result in the desired motion. For most of us who cannot fully relax or hold ourselves well, we need to make all SORTS of compensations. I have seen a series of photos of O-sensei, where he is standing in the midst of four men holding bokken (wooden sword). All are relaxed in the first photo - bokken down. In the second, the bokken rise to strike. O-sensei remains still. In the third, they have reached their peak. Still he does not move. In the last photo, the bokken reach the end of their strike, and he is standing outside the circle - perfectly still.
I believe that to throw a punch, dance, pour a cup of tea is not defined by the action inherent. Some other multitude of factors, mostly unperceived, must lie behind every action. And at the base of this... necessarily the spirit. A great why. For what reason do we perform this action? This fundamental aspect necessarily dictates the end action. It seems to me, however, that we cannot simply purify our spirit. We do not have direct access (and for this reason, nor do we have the ability to rightly judge the actions around us). We have to work backwards through the realm of actions and senses until we come to the heart of ourselves. This is the purpose of training, and also the answer to how certain actions are inherently different from seemingly similar ones.
I am seeking spiritual integration. I don't pretend to know what this really means. I imagine that the zen master's actions are so mystifying, because he acts with an integrated spirit. Indeed how could I ever make sense of the Sermon on the Mount without this? I act like a sack of potatoes. Throwing myself this way and that, and letting one tiny part carry the rest of the body someplace I never intended.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Take that, Niccolo!
"...in the long run of history the end is pre-existing in the means. The means represent the ideal in the making and the end in process."
-1963 speech at Western Michigan University, Martin Luther King, Jr.
-1963 speech at Western Michigan University, Martin Luther King, Jr.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
pregnant
I think I know what it feels like to go crazy. It's a pregnant frustration. I've seen people dance it; I've heard Kanye rap about it. You don't quite know what's wrong, but somehow the world is playing (or you're playing) the wrong key. This silent grating continues relentlessly. It's like listening to Wagner; there's always that dissonance. Even the resolution has dissonance. Only this version isn't beautiful. How is a man supposed to cope, when he can hardly state what the issue is? I have ferocious ambition. It's consuming.
I fear that this state will never resolve, because I can't find the model I'm looking for. I see no life I want. Everything is a little too much somebody else, not enough me. I look to Warren Buffett, Isadora Duncan, Steve Jobs, Morihei Ueshiba, Lao Tzu, Alcibiades, Rumi, Whitman, countless others. My body shakes, my thought blurs. I don't intend to be a "gentleman philosopher." I'm not reading because I like it. I'm laying groundwork. I'm defining possibility. And yes, I feel like I'm behind some measure of what my life should be. If I could be anything other than this, I would consider it. Maybe.
What is left when you feel a tiger inside? The world feels like a zoo. Only I know that's not what the world really is. The world is a wilderness, therefore I need a paradigm shift. Maybe I'm the zoo. "What immortal hand or eye dare frame thy fearful symmetry?"
The shaking continues.
I fear that this state will never resolve, because I can't find the model I'm looking for. I see no life I want. Everything is a little too much somebody else, not enough me. I look to Warren Buffett, Isadora Duncan, Steve Jobs, Morihei Ueshiba, Lao Tzu, Alcibiades, Rumi, Whitman, countless others. My body shakes, my thought blurs. I don't intend to be a "gentleman philosopher." I'm not reading because I like it. I'm laying groundwork. I'm defining possibility. And yes, I feel like I'm behind some measure of what my life should be. If I could be anything other than this, I would consider it. Maybe.
What is left when you feel a tiger inside? The world feels like a zoo. Only I know that's not what the world really is. The world is a wilderness, therefore I need a paradigm shift. Maybe I'm the zoo. "What immortal hand or eye dare frame thy fearful symmetry?"
The shaking continues.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
a story of creation
The track ready, the control room clears out. Wayne leans back in his chair and closes his eyes. An array of cigars and Vitamin Waters is strewn across the mixing board in front of him. By now, it's 3:01. In the lobby, Liz brews up a pot of coffee. "This will go on for a while," she says.
A long while. For the next two hours, it's the same eight-bar loop, playing at full volume on nonstop repeat. It's like the hip-hop cell at Guantanamo.
For a long time, he just sits there, listening.
At 3:55, he comes out of the control room and goes over to one of his assistants, a cute Tulane grad named Devin. "Hey," he asks her, "Girl Scouts sell cookies, right?"
"Yep."
"And Boy Scouts don't?"
"Nope."
"Ain't that a bitch." He goes back into the booth.
At 4:09, he emerges again, pouring himself more coffee. (No cream, lots of sugar.) He's rapping now - no words yet, just syllables, a cadence. "Da-da da-da da-da da-da da-da da-da DA da."
By 4:32, the ashtray is filling up, Styrofoam cups multiplying in front of him. He calls Scoob in, spits a couple of bars, and asks him what he thinks. He's getting closer.
At 5:10, Devin, Marley and Scoob are all asleep, but Wayne is coming alive. He's laughing to himself, nodding like he might finally have something. Suddenly, at 5:16, it's go time. He yells to Mike, who races back to the booth, battle stations on a submarine.
"A-ight," Wayne says in the booth. "Lezgo."
It's thrilling to watch the thing take shape. A couple of times he flubs a line, tackles it again. The whole thing is finished in about four minutes. Wayne signals for the playback and sits, eyes closed, listening to himself...
-Feb, 2011 Rolling Stone (1123)
A long while. For the next two hours, it's the same eight-bar loop, playing at full volume on nonstop repeat. It's like the hip-hop cell at Guantanamo.
For a long time, he just sits there, listening.
At 3:55, he comes out of the control room and goes over to one of his assistants, a cute Tulane grad named Devin. "Hey," he asks her, "Girl Scouts sell cookies, right?"
"Yep."
"And Boy Scouts don't?"
"Nope."
"Ain't that a bitch." He goes back into the booth.
At 4:09, he emerges again, pouring himself more coffee. (No cream, lots of sugar.) He's rapping now - no words yet, just syllables, a cadence. "Da-da da-da da-da da-da da-da da-da DA da."
By 4:32, the ashtray is filling up, Styrofoam cups multiplying in front of him. He calls Scoob in, spits a couple of bars, and asks him what he thinks. He's getting closer.
At 5:10, Devin, Marley and Scoob are all asleep, but Wayne is coming alive. He's laughing to himself, nodding like he might finally have something. Suddenly, at 5:16, it's go time. He yells to Mike, who races back to the booth, battle stations on a submarine.
"A-ight," Wayne says in the booth. "Lezgo."
It's thrilling to watch the thing take shape. A couple of times he flubs a line, tackles it again. The whole thing is finished in about four minutes. Wayne signals for the playback and sits, eyes closed, listening to himself...
-Feb, 2011 Rolling Stone (1123)
Monday, January 24, 2011
poetry
I am not a poetry buff. I haven't read very many poets. When considering poetry as an abstract whole, I feel vaguely unsettled. The memory of the very few poets I was made to read in school comes back, and I recall mostly unknown vocabulary and unknown sentiments. I have enjoyed Shakespeare and Donne. Rumi and Hafiz are more like spiritual friends than poets to me. I tend to read what falls into my lap, though my screening process is adept. The other day I was in the aisle looking for a book of some sort - now I couldn't tell you what it was. I saw a book of poetry by Melville... Really? He wrote poetry? If I'm forced to answer what my favorite book is, and the sun falls just right, I might tell you The Whale, but I didn't know he wrote poetry. Glancing through the book but not feeling that call, I looked further. My heart sunk inside somewhere: Walt Whitman. There's a poet with whom I am so little versed, yet always seemed discussed in school. The ubiquitous name Leaves of Grass comes to mind, along with a slight memory of lines and lines and lines. No rhyming. No sense. Oh god, my breath gets a little short. But naturally I have to listen to my little voice inside, and I had come across some of his lines recently elsewhere.
I check out the easiest looking book - a really big version of Song of Myself. Hell, the poem is only 44 pages, and I feel a little like I'm reading Jumanji as a kid, so it's ok. I remember my friend's advice to just read - forget all that analysis crap they taught in school. Just read. I can do that.
I just wrote out a line to tell how pleased I am with Mr. Whitman, but blasphemy and cursing probably show how little I've learned from the man. For a taste of the feeling, consider that the book was originally published with no authorship on the front, and only in the 24th page does he clue us in:
Walt Whitman, an American, one of the roughs, a kosmos,
Disorderly flesh and sensual.... eating drinking and breeding,
No sentimentalist.... no stander above men and women or apart from them.... no more modest than immodest.
- 499-502
Walt puts words, lots of them, to my sentiment that I am the biggest and the smallest of us. I have always felt it to be my due to be able to accomplish anything that anyone else has accomplished, and then more. And why not, I am a man just as they. Of course I've received laughs, cynicism, disbelief, and mostly just a quiet pressure (applied from the deep subconscious) to stop believing such things. So for whatever it's worth, Walt is beautifully filling my heart to the brim. Hey, maybe I can do this poetry stuff. I think the real issue - reading poetry - is having lived a certain extent, and then simply having the vocabulary and mental tenacity to sit down with a poem. When you can discipline yourself, I find that poetry is not some abstract, pedantic verbal expurgation. It is simply a man talking to another.
----------------------------
My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,
With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds.
Speech is the twin of my vision.... it is unequal to measure itself.
It provokes me forever,
It says sarcastically, Walt, you understand enough.... why don't you let it out then?
Come now I will not be tantalized.... you conceive too much of articulation.
- 566-571
I check out the easiest looking book - a really big version of Song of Myself. Hell, the poem is only 44 pages, and I feel a little like I'm reading Jumanji as a kid, so it's ok. I remember my friend's advice to just read - forget all that analysis crap they taught in school. Just read. I can do that.
I just wrote out a line to tell how pleased I am with Mr. Whitman, but blasphemy and cursing probably show how little I've learned from the man. For a taste of the feeling, consider that the book was originally published with no authorship on the front, and only in the 24th page does he clue us in:
Walt Whitman, an American, one of the roughs, a kosmos,
Disorderly flesh and sensual.... eating drinking and breeding,
No sentimentalist.... no stander above men and women or apart from them.... no more modest than immodest.
- 499-502
Walt puts words, lots of them, to my sentiment that I am the biggest and the smallest of us. I have always felt it to be my due to be able to accomplish anything that anyone else has accomplished, and then more. And why not, I am a man just as they. Of course I've received laughs, cynicism, disbelief, and mostly just a quiet pressure (applied from the deep subconscious) to stop believing such things. So for whatever it's worth, Walt is beautifully filling my heart to the brim. Hey, maybe I can do this poetry stuff. I think the real issue - reading poetry - is having lived a certain extent, and then simply having the vocabulary and mental tenacity to sit down with a poem. When you can discipline yourself, I find that poetry is not some abstract, pedantic verbal expurgation. It is simply a man talking to another.
----------------------------
My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach,
With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds and volumes of worlds.
Speech is the twin of my vision.... it is unequal to measure itself.
It provokes me forever,
It says sarcastically, Walt, you understand enough.... why don't you let it out then?
Come now I will not be tantalized.... you conceive too much of articulation.
- 566-571
Saturday, January 22, 2011
sitting
I stayed up all night last week. I sat and sat, getting bored in the darkness. Hoping not to get caught by park rangers wandering Mt. Tabor. I don't think they wander much in the middle of the night. There was no wind in the late hours. It was odd to experience a quiet moment on the hills. The trees stood still for hours on end. Just darkness and then the slowly creeping light. As the sun started to rise - it was a drizzly, grey morning - the light began to fill the dome. Because of the clouds, there was never a moment when the rays burst forth, but each moment became a little lighter. I found myself wondering how I would know the morning when it arrived. (!) At some point, however, it was light enough to see dogs and people walking past me, which I took as my cue.
Reflecting I find myself thinking about the nature of time. I remember those moments of sitting in a classroom watching the rotating minute hand of a clock. It's not that you could actually see the movement of the clock, but through some amalgamation of remembered moments you sensed the movement. Even though, sometimes I really thought I could see that hand move. That's how it felt to watch the sun rise. It occurs to me that maybe this perception of the passage of time contains the secrets I'm looking for. Why would people meditate? Bruce Blair told me about realizing he didn't know when the candles blew out while sitting. This taught him something about awareness.
Perhaps, the passage of time is necessarily a moving and a stillness. I think this is why I feel so disheveled in NYC - there is no stillness. I get wrapped up in all the excitement and energy, and I convince my unbelieving self that to live means motion. But sitting beneath tall trees on a windless night tells a different story. These trees know stillness. I wonder how a 4000 year old tree experiences time. I imagine it's something like I do - the combination of movement and stillness. Is the tree aware of its own growth (probably not). It can, however, certainly mark the passage of time as it grows bigger. What about the fly? Does the fly feel like he moves in fast-forward? Or do we just move in relatively different senses of time? And to the tree, does he feel that his life is so long, or does he experience life and death just as I do? I imagine that the passage of time is really just a subjective occurrence, and that to sit and understand the nature of this most perplexing of things is to know the world.
Inch by inch --
Little snail
Creep up and up Mt. Fuji
To change ourselves is to understand motion and stillness as two aspects of time. Every moment must stand alone, and therefore we must choose how we stand. However as the moments are strung together, our life turns into what we will it. But what a long and slow process it can seem! Maybe that is the deliciousness of it. Maybe we actually derive our power from the possibility of seeing time as a standalone moment. I don't believe St. Exupery when he talks about the lamplighter in Le Petit Prince. He says that the lamplighter lights and puts out his lamp every day and night, but through some twist of fate, his planet spins faster and faster. When the little Prince visits, he is lighting and putting out his lamp once per minute. Because of this, he cannot rest. I think that God has let our rope out much further, taking away such oppression and leaving us with the possibility of a quiet moment that stares into our face, compelling us to know what is.
Einstein said, relativity is the fact that one minute with a hand on a hot stove feels like one hour, and one hour sitting near a pretty girl feels like one minute. If I were really aware, wouldn't each of those moments feel like one minute? I seem to be bouncing about between extremes, and not just in reference to time, but in all my life. Too much salt, too little. Too much body motion, too little. Too much self-deprecation, too little critique. Much of life seems to be found in the swing of the pendulum, whereas I only feel the stopping points. It seems that everything well done follows the Buddha's (or Aristotle's) middle way. The perfect ratio of anything isn't marked by anything. To find this place of perfection then is to train one's self to be sensitive. We start to develop an intuitive sense of what is right - where to go, who to be. To live in time then seems to be a search for this middle way - finding harmony between the stillness and the ever changing.
Reflecting I find myself thinking about the nature of time. I remember those moments of sitting in a classroom watching the rotating minute hand of a clock. It's not that you could actually see the movement of the clock, but through some amalgamation of remembered moments you sensed the movement. Even though, sometimes I really thought I could see that hand move. That's how it felt to watch the sun rise. It occurs to me that maybe this perception of the passage of time contains the secrets I'm looking for. Why would people meditate? Bruce Blair told me about realizing he didn't know when the candles blew out while sitting. This taught him something about awareness.
Perhaps, the passage of time is necessarily a moving and a stillness. I think this is why I feel so disheveled in NYC - there is no stillness. I get wrapped up in all the excitement and energy, and I convince my unbelieving self that to live means motion. But sitting beneath tall trees on a windless night tells a different story. These trees know stillness. I wonder how a 4000 year old tree experiences time. I imagine it's something like I do - the combination of movement and stillness. Is the tree aware of its own growth (probably not). It can, however, certainly mark the passage of time as it grows bigger. What about the fly? Does the fly feel like he moves in fast-forward? Or do we just move in relatively different senses of time? And to the tree, does he feel that his life is so long, or does he experience life and death just as I do? I imagine that the passage of time is really just a subjective occurrence, and that to sit and understand the nature of this most perplexing of things is to know the world.
Inch by inch --
Little snail
Creep up and up Mt. Fuji
To change ourselves is to understand motion and stillness as two aspects of time. Every moment must stand alone, and therefore we must choose how we stand. However as the moments are strung together, our life turns into what we will it. But what a long and slow process it can seem! Maybe that is the deliciousness of it. Maybe we actually derive our power from the possibility of seeing time as a standalone moment. I don't believe St. Exupery when he talks about the lamplighter in Le Petit Prince. He says that the lamplighter lights and puts out his lamp every day and night, but through some twist of fate, his planet spins faster and faster. When the little Prince visits, he is lighting and putting out his lamp once per minute. Because of this, he cannot rest. I think that God has let our rope out much further, taking away such oppression and leaving us with the possibility of a quiet moment that stares into our face, compelling us to know what is.
Einstein said, relativity is the fact that one minute with a hand on a hot stove feels like one hour, and one hour sitting near a pretty girl feels like one minute. If I were really aware, wouldn't each of those moments feel like one minute? I seem to be bouncing about between extremes, and not just in reference to time, but in all my life. Too much salt, too little. Too much body motion, too little. Too much self-deprecation, too little critique. Much of life seems to be found in the swing of the pendulum, whereas I only feel the stopping points. It seems that everything well done follows the Buddha's (or Aristotle's) middle way. The perfect ratio of anything isn't marked by anything. To find this place of perfection then is to train one's self to be sensitive. We start to develop an intuitive sense of what is right - where to go, who to be. To live in time then seems to be a search for this middle way - finding harmony between the stillness and the ever changing.
Nanao, again.
the world of dew
is just the world of dew
and yet... and yet
Inch by inch --
Little snail
Creep up and up Mt. Fuji
Pissing pissing
Down there
an iris blooming
Don't give up the game
skinny frog!
Issa is here
-haiku by Issa, translated by Nanao Sadaki
----------------------------
When you hear dirty story
wash your ears.
When you see ugly stuff
wash your eyes.
When you get bad thoughts
wash your mind.
and
Keep your feet muddy.
-Nanao
is just the world of dew
and yet... and yet
Inch by inch --
Little snail
Creep up and up Mt. Fuji
Pissing pissing
Down there
an iris blooming
Don't give up the game
skinny frog!
Issa is here
-haiku by Issa, translated by Nanao Sadaki
----------------------------
When you hear dirty story
wash your ears.
When you see ugly stuff
wash your eyes.
When you get bad thoughts
wash your mind.
and
Keep your feet muddy.
-Nanao
Friday, January 21, 2011
Nanao Sakaki
Blow out your candle! -see the stars twinkling.
Blow out the stars! -There, lightning.
Pick off your eyeballs! --sweet-heart-ocean-waves sounding.
Pluck your ears! -I smell of honey, milk, and wine's river.
Cut off your nose! -Kiss me please.
Shut your mouth! -my skin breathing, touching, talking.
Take off your skin! Muscles, intestines, all your bones
Hanging upside down
Homo sapiens sapiens
In a meat market
In a megalopolis
In a great century.
How much money
Would you pay
To have your body back?
-Nanao
If you have time to chatter
Read books
If you have time to read
Walk into mountain, desert and ocean
If you have time to walk
Sing Songs and dance
If you have time to dance
Sit quietly, you Happy Lucky Idiot
-Nanao
Blow out the stars! -There, lightning.
Pick off your eyeballs! --sweet-heart-ocean-waves sounding.
Pluck your ears! -I smell of honey, milk, and wine's river.
Cut off your nose! -Kiss me please.
Shut your mouth! -my skin breathing, touching, talking.
Take off your skin! Muscles, intestines, all your bones
Hanging upside down
Homo sapiens sapiens
In a meat market
In a megalopolis
In a great century.
How much money
Would you pay
To have your body back?
-Nanao
If you have time to chatter
Read books
If you have time to read
Walk into mountain, desert and ocean
If you have time to walk
Sing Songs and dance
If you have time to dance
Sit quietly, you Happy Lucky Idiot
-Nanao
-----------------------------
Rumi shatters something, and Nanao rushes in.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
distillation
Life seems to be a process of distillation. As Thomas Keller would say, "we're always skimming, skimming, skimming." Reduction, clarification, intensification. I've heard that a great work of art puts you in the mindset of the artist. If so, mustn't the artist have clarified his intention to its essence? What do you think Michelangelo felt slaving over the great chapel ceiling?
The work of the alchemist takes years and years of labor - and all for what? A man can't eat gold.
The work of the alchemist takes years and years of labor - and all for what? A man can't eat gold.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
on the road, the path, the way
I hope that my friend Josh will forgive me, but I am going to quote his recent correspondence with me. I was just sitting in a coffee shop, realizing that I forgot his letter in the car. I just received it and was really wanting to read it. I spent some time doing other things - I have some books and the computer, but the letter kept nagging me. Finally I went back to get it, and started thinking along the way that sometimes you just have to do what you WANT to do. I can read all the Rumi and Plato I want, but if what I really want to do is read a letter, I'll never be in the right mindset. This just clarified my whole experience of life since the summer. I have in that time decreased my outer responsibilities significantly. To the point where I might be considered a vagrant, but when one has nothing in particular to do, you find some interesting things. When all options are still options and therefore equal, I find that I desire one thing. It's almost always one thing. Today it was subsequently going to the bathhouse, changing address, drinking coffee, calling an old friend and acquaintance, walking Mt. Tabor, short meditation, picking up mail, and then meeting a friend. The funny thing about it all is that somehow my life gets ordered and taken care of exactly how I want it to. And here is the subtlety of it. It almost seems that there is one path for me to take. As I take each subsequent step, the next ones become easier. My mood relaxes - joy takes over. I eat when I want. Sleep when I want. Drink when I want, and most importantly dance when I want. It sounds obvious, but I don't think I've ever really lived my life like this. I always have these quiet mutterings telling me what I NEED to do. Blah blah blah. But everything becomes so much easier when I just do what I want.
And here's Josh:
[on travel] "I often do find what I'm looking for, but perhaps only because I usually am looking for something. many of us hit the road without any goal, or with what is the same thing, with a vague goal that is too large. Mine are always too large but never vague. I use travel. It is my tool, not me its. But of course, part of it is really getting lost. Even, for a time, losing sight of one's aim and letting the road control you. Otherwise it wouldn't work to travel, would it?"
It's funny that as I went walking to the car to find that letter I really needed to read, I found my own thoughts articulately echoed. Or maybe it's not funny (as I'm coming to suspect). The ironic element of all this is that as I free myself to my desires, I am actually constricting myself to something very demanding. The life I choose is set for a purpose. My goal is not "vague," so that each moment has a certain meaning. A friend commented recently that my dance is always getting better. I answered, of course it is - I work on it every moment. Whether this is in meditation, changing my posture, eating certain food, relaxing, reading Rumi, whatever - it's all for a very specific purpose. I never lose sight of this on a large scale. Everything starts to shed light on the philosophy of my life - something that will eventually characterize my dance. So to read poetry, yes I'm working on dance.
The other interesting thing about this thought of there being a true path for us to take is that we necessarily lose the trail. I must necessarily take wrong steps. In fact, much of my life could be considered a "wrong step," but it's really the wrong way of thinking about it. If in fact this path is determined by the eventual goal, every "wrong step" is actually helping to clarify that goal. Once that goal is set (will it ever be complete?) to then take a "wrong step" is simply to learn the error. Correction is the game. A life of corrections. Until finally the arrow will fly straight.
And here's Josh:
[on travel] "I often do find what I'm looking for, but perhaps only because I usually am looking for something. many of us hit the road without any goal, or with what is the same thing, with a vague goal that is too large. Mine are always too large but never vague. I use travel. It is my tool, not me its. But of course, part of it is really getting lost. Even, for a time, losing sight of one's aim and letting the road control you. Otherwise it wouldn't work to travel, would it?"
It's funny that as I went walking to the car to find that letter I really needed to read, I found my own thoughts articulately echoed. Or maybe it's not funny (as I'm coming to suspect). The ironic element of all this is that as I free myself to my desires, I am actually constricting myself to something very demanding. The life I choose is set for a purpose. My goal is not "vague," so that each moment has a certain meaning. A friend commented recently that my dance is always getting better. I answered, of course it is - I work on it every moment. Whether this is in meditation, changing my posture, eating certain food, relaxing, reading Rumi, whatever - it's all for a very specific purpose. I never lose sight of this on a large scale. Everything starts to shed light on the philosophy of my life - something that will eventually characterize my dance. So to read poetry, yes I'm working on dance.
The other interesting thing about this thought of there being a true path for us to take is that we necessarily lose the trail. I must necessarily take wrong steps. In fact, much of my life could be considered a "wrong step," but it's really the wrong way of thinking about it. If in fact this path is determined by the eventual goal, every "wrong step" is actually helping to clarify that goal. Once that goal is set (will it ever be complete?) to then take a "wrong step" is simply to learn the error. Correction is the game. A life of corrections. Until finally the arrow will fly straight.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Wolf talking about the blues
"When you ain't got no money - you can't pay no house rent and can't buy you no food, you damn sure got the blues. That's where it's at... That's where it's at... If you ain't got no money, you got the blues. 'Cause you thinking evil. That's right. Anytime you thinking evil, you thinking 'bout the blues."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ654Lg6m8k
------------------------------------
I'm reading up on my man Chester Burnett. What I would give to have been able to see him play live. It was like a train, tearing everything up along its way. The only thing I've ever seen that had that feeling of life was Cedric Burnside and Lightnin' Malcolm. Damn, I want that spark.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ654Lg6m8k
------------------------------------
I'm reading up on my man Chester Burnett. What I would give to have been able to see him play live. It was like a train, tearing everything up along its way. The only thing I've ever seen that had that feeling of life was Cedric Burnside and Lightnin' Malcolm. Damn, I want that spark.
Monday, January 17, 2011
the world is too loud for me
I can't seem to hear the things... which things? I'm not even sure which things. All I feel is the absence of something in the turmoil. Sometimes when I'm dancing I hear the music. Other times, I hear something regular, but it's most likely my racing mind. So why does a man step away? How can you explain such a decision that moves contrary to every implicit value of society? How about I quote Rumi? That seems fitting.
A close childhood friend once came to visit Joseph.
They had shared the secrets that children tell each other
when they're lying on their pillows at night
before they go to sleep. These two
were completely truthful
with each other.
The friend asked, "What was it like when you realized
your brothers were jealous and what they planned to do?"
"I felt like a lion with a chain around its neck.
Not degraded by the chain, and not complaining,
but just waiting for my power to be recognized."
"How about down in the well, and in prison?
How was it then?"
"Like the moon when it's getting
smaller, yet knowing the fullness to come.
Like a seed pearl ground in the mortar for medicine,
that knows it will now be the light in a human eye.
Like a wheat grain that breaks open in the ground,
then grows, then gets harvested, then crushed in the mill
for flour, then baked, then crushed again between teeth
to become a person's deepest understanding.
Lost in love, like the songs the planters sing
the night after they sow the seed."
--------------------------------
Am I singing my own praises? Not necessarily. Something inside feels a little self-conscious to speak in such terms, but I pass it off as the all-pervasive modern sense of irony (ironic sense of modernity?) that knows no sincerity, no humor, no love. Today is a day for other things. The sun was shining today like it was spring here in Portland - although without the rain. Things buzz in the sun; people wake up. We all look around and for just a moment the clouds get thinner.
So what if I want things that feel cliche? Le couer a ses raisons que la raison ne connait pas. Who am I to belittle my own desires? They were not created by me. If you watch a tree dance in the wind, you realize that the tree does not resist the movement. In fact, every little breeze that moves the branches reverberates throughout the trunk. If you look closer, you realize that the movement may be caused by an outside actor, but the quality is determined by its rootedness. Thus we find that the dance - the purest expression of whim and surrender - is caused by the deepest sense of purpose and intention. The ephemeral is merely another expression of that which endures.
So maybe you can understand my need for silence.
A close childhood friend once came to visit Joseph.
They had shared the secrets that children tell each other
when they're lying on their pillows at night
before they go to sleep. These two
were completely truthful
with each other.
The friend asked, "What was it like when you realized
your brothers were jealous and what they planned to do?"
"I felt like a lion with a chain around its neck.
Not degraded by the chain, and not complaining,
but just waiting for my power to be recognized."
"How about down in the well, and in prison?
How was it then?"
"Like the moon when it's getting
smaller, yet knowing the fullness to come.
Like a seed pearl ground in the mortar for medicine,
that knows it will now be the light in a human eye.
Like a wheat grain that breaks open in the ground,
then grows, then gets harvested, then crushed in the mill
for flour, then baked, then crushed again between teeth
to become a person's deepest understanding.
Lost in love, like the songs the planters sing
the night after they sow the seed."
--------------------------------
Am I singing my own praises? Not necessarily. Something inside feels a little self-conscious to speak in such terms, but I pass it off as the all-pervasive modern sense of irony (ironic sense of modernity?) that knows no sincerity, no humor, no love. Today is a day for other things. The sun was shining today like it was spring here in Portland - although without the rain. Things buzz in the sun; people wake up. We all look around and for just a moment the clouds get thinner.
So what if I want things that feel cliche? Le couer a ses raisons que la raison ne connait pas. Who am I to belittle my own desires? They were not created by me. If you watch a tree dance in the wind, you realize that the tree does not resist the movement. In fact, every little breeze that moves the branches reverberates throughout the trunk. If you look closer, you realize that the movement may be caused by an outside actor, but the quality is determined by its rootedness. Thus we find that the dance - the purest expression of whim and surrender - is caused by the deepest sense of purpose and intention. The ephemeral is merely another expression of that which endures.
So maybe you can understand my need for silence.
seduction (on Rumi)
A murmuring flow of words
as I sit on the bench.
They whisper,
I know you.
It is a drop of poison in the king's ear,
racking the house of the Danes, bringing all
labors to an end.
What air is this I breathe?
What stones do I walk on?
The world is left behind.
Layers are peeled away.
This is a madness, a Lethe I drink.
Falling from the wings of a sparrow
I am frozen on your page.
Close the book and I shall be crushed.
Certainty lies in promises and
judgment in a caress.
as I sit on the bench.
They whisper,
I know you.
It is a drop of poison in the king's ear,
racking the house of the Danes, bringing all
labors to an end.
What air is this I breathe?
What stones do I walk on?
The world is left behind.
Layers are peeled away.
This is a madness, a Lethe I drink.
Falling from the wings of a sparrow
I am frozen on your page.
Close the book and I shall be crushed.
Certainty lies in promises and
judgment in a caress.
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Muhammad and the Huge Eater
Husam demands that we begin Book V.
Ziyq-Haqq, the radiance of truth, Husamuddin,
master to the pure masters,
if my human throat were not so narrow,
I would praise you as you should be praised,
in some language other than this world-language,
but a domestic fowl is not a falcon.
We must mix the varnish we have
and brush it on.
I'm not talking to materialists. When I mention Husam,
I speak only to those who know spiritual secrets.
Praise is simply drawing back the curtains
to let his qualities in. The sun,
of course, remains apart
from what I say.
What the sayer of praise is really praising is
himself, by saying implicitly,
"My eyes are clear."
Likewise, someone who criticizes is criticizing
himself, saying implicitly, "I can't see very well
with my eyes so inflamed."
Don't ever feel sorry for someone
who wants to be the sun, that other sun,
the one that makes rotten things fresh.
And don't ever envy someone
who wants to be this world.
Husam is the sun I mean.
He can't be understood with the mind, or said,
but we'll stumble and stagger trying to.
Just because you can't drink all that falls
doesn't mean you give up taking sips
of rainwater. If the nut
of the mystery can't be held,
at least let me touch the shell.
Husam, refresh my words, your words.
My words are only a husk to your knowing,
an earth atmosphere to your enormous spaces.
What I say is meant only to point to that, to you,
so that whoever ever hears these words will not grieve
that they never had a chance to look.
your presence draws me out from vanity
and imagination and opinion.
Awe is the salve
that will heal our eyes.
And keen, constant listening.
Stay out in the open like a date palm
lifting its arms. Don't bore mouse holes
in the ground, arguing inside some
doctrinal labyrinth.
That intellectual warp and woof keeps you wrapped
in blindness. And four other characteristics
keep you from loving. The Qur'an calls them
four birds. Say Bismallah, "In the name of God,"
and chop the heads off those mischief-birds.
The rooster of lust, the peacock of wanting
to be famous, the crow of ownership, and the duck
of urgency, kill them and revive them
in another form, changed and harmless.
There is a duck inside you.
her bill is never still, searching through dry
and wet alike, like the robber in an empty house
cramming objects in his sack, pearls, chickpeas,
anything. Always thinking, "There's no time!
I won't get another chance!"
A True Person is more calm and deliberate.
He or she doesn't worry about interruptions.
But that duck is so afraid of missing out
that it's lost all generosity, and frighteningly expanded
its capacity to take in food.
A large group of unbelievers
once came to see Muhammad,
knowing he would feed them.
Muhammad told his friends,
"Divide these guests among you and tend to them.
Since you are all filled with me,
it will be as though I am the host."
Each friend of Muhammad chose a guest,
but there was one huge person left behind.
He sat in the entrance of the mosque
like thick dregs in a cup.
So Muhammad invited the man to his own household,
where the enormous son of a Ghuzz Turk ate everything,
the milk of seven goats and enough food
for eighteen people!
The others in the house were furious.
When the man went to bed, the maid slammed the door
behind him and chained it shut, out of meanness
and resentment. Around midnight, the man
felt several strong urges at once.
But the door! he works it,
puts a blade through the crack. Nothing.
The urgency increases. The room contracts.
He falls back into a confused sleep and dreams
of a desolate place, since he himself is
such a desolate place.
So, dreaming he's by himself,
he squeezes out a huge amount,
and another huge amount.
But he soon becomes conscious enough
to know that the covers he gathers around him
are full of shit. He shakes with spasms of the shame
that usually keeps men from doing such things.
He thinks, "My sleep is worse than my being awake.
the waking is just full of food.
My sleep is all this."
Now he's crying, bitterly embarrassed,
waiting for dawn and the noise of the door opening,
hoping that somehow he can get out
without anyone seeing him as he is.
I'll shorten it. The door opens. He's saved.
Muhammad comes at dawn. He opens the door
and becomes invisible so the man won't feel ashamed,
so he can escape and wash himself
and not have to face the door-opener.
Someone completely absorbed in Allah like Muhammad
can do this. Muhammad had seen all that went on
in the night, but he held back from letting the man out,
until all happened as it needed to happen.
Many actions which seem cruel
are from a deep friendship.
Many demolitions are actually renovations.
Later, a meddlesome servant
brought Muhammad the bedclothes.
"Look what your guest has done!"
Muhammad smiles, himself a mercy given to all beings,
"Bring me a bucket of water."
Everyone jumps up, "No! Let us do this.
We live to serve your, and this is the kind of hand-work
we can do. Yours is the inner heart-work."
"I know that, but this is an extraordinary occasion."
A voice inside him is saying, "There is great wisdom
in washing these bedclothes. Wash them."
Meanwhile, the man who soiled the covers and fled
is returning to Muhammad's house. He has left behind
an amulet that he always carried.
He enters and sees the hands of God
washing his incredibly dirty linen.
He forgets the amulet. A great love suddenly enters him.
He tears his shirt open. He strikes his head
against the wall and the door. Blood
pours from his nose.
People come from other parts of the house.
He's shrieking, "Stay away!"
He hits his head, "I have no understanding!"
He prostrates himself before Muhammad.
"You are the whole. I am a despicable, tiny,
meaningless piece. I can't look at you."
He's quiet and quivering with remorse.
Muhammad bends over and holds him and caresses him
and opens his inner knowing.
The cloud weeps, and then the garden sprouts.
The baby cries, and the mother's milk flows.
The nurse of creation has said, Let them cry a lot.
This rain-weeping and sun-burning twine together
to make us grow. Keep your intelligence white-hot
and your grief glistening, so your life will stay fresh.
Cry easily like a little child.
Let body needs dwindle and soul decisions increase.
Diminish what you give your physical self.
Your spiritual eye will begin to open.
When the body empties and stays empty,
God fills it with musk and mother-of-pearl.
that way a man gives his dung and gets purity.
listen to the prophets, not to some adolescent boy.
the foundation and the walls of the spiritual life
are made of self-denials and disciplines.
Stay with friends who support you in these.
Talk with them about sacred texts,
and how you're doing, and how they're doing,
and keep your practices together.
- Rumi
--------------------
This poem screams to me like a Van Gogh painting.
What is it to know something of god?
Burn inside that presence. Burn up.
- Rumi
And they said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the Scriptures?
- Luke 24:32
Ziyq-Haqq, the radiance of truth, Husamuddin,
master to the pure masters,
if my human throat were not so narrow,
I would praise you as you should be praised,
in some language other than this world-language,
but a domestic fowl is not a falcon.
We must mix the varnish we have
and brush it on.
I'm not talking to materialists. When I mention Husam,
I speak only to those who know spiritual secrets.
Praise is simply drawing back the curtains
to let his qualities in. The sun,
of course, remains apart
from what I say.
What the sayer of praise is really praising is
himself, by saying implicitly,
"My eyes are clear."
Likewise, someone who criticizes is criticizing
himself, saying implicitly, "I can't see very well
with my eyes so inflamed."
Don't ever feel sorry for someone
who wants to be the sun, that other sun,
the one that makes rotten things fresh.
And don't ever envy someone
who wants to be this world.
Husam is the sun I mean.
He can't be understood with the mind, or said,
but we'll stumble and stagger trying to.
Just because you can't drink all that falls
doesn't mean you give up taking sips
of rainwater. If the nut
of the mystery can't be held,
at least let me touch the shell.
Husam, refresh my words, your words.
My words are only a husk to your knowing,
an earth atmosphere to your enormous spaces.
What I say is meant only to point to that, to you,
so that whoever ever hears these words will not grieve
that they never had a chance to look.
your presence draws me out from vanity
and imagination and opinion.
Awe is the salve
that will heal our eyes.
And keen, constant listening.
Stay out in the open like a date palm
lifting its arms. Don't bore mouse holes
in the ground, arguing inside some
doctrinal labyrinth.
That intellectual warp and woof keeps you wrapped
in blindness. And four other characteristics
keep you from loving. The Qur'an calls them
four birds. Say Bismallah, "In the name of God,"
and chop the heads off those mischief-birds.
The rooster of lust, the peacock of wanting
to be famous, the crow of ownership, and the duck
of urgency, kill them and revive them
in another form, changed and harmless.
There is a duck inside you.
her bill is never still, searching through dry
and wet alike, like the robber in an empty house
cramming objects in his sack, pearls, chickpeas,
anything. Always thinking, "There's no time!
I won't get another chance!"
A True Person is more calm and deliberate.
He or she doesn't worry about interruptions.
But that duck is so afraid of missing out
that it's lost all generosity, and frighteningly expanded
its capacity to take in food.
A large group of unbelievers
once came to see Muhammad,
knowing he would feed them.
Muhammad told his friends,
"Divide these guests among you and tend to them.
Since you are all filled with me,
it will be as though I am the host."
Each friend of Muhammad chose a guest,
but there was one huge person left behind.
He sat in the entrance of the mosque
like thick dregs in a cup.
So Muhammad invited the man to his own household,
where the enormous son of a Ghuzz Turk ate everything,
the milk of seven goats and enough food
for eighteen people!
The others in the house were furious.
When the man went to bed, the maid slammed the door
behind him and chained it shut, out of meanness
and resentment. Around midnight, the man
felt several strong urges at once.
But the door! he works it,
puts a blade through the crack. Nothing.
The urgency increases. The room contracts.
He falls back into a confused sleep and dreams
of a desolate place, since he himself is
such a desolate place.
So, dreaming he's by himself,
he squeezes out a huge amount,
and another huge amount.
But he soon becomes conscious enough
to know that the covers he gathers around him
are full of shit. He shakes with spasms of the shame
that usually keeps men from doing such things.
He thinks, "My sleep is worse than my being awake.
the waking is just full of food.
My sleep is all this."
Now he's crying, bitterly embarrassed,
waiting for dawn and the noise of the door opening,
hoping that somehow he can get out
without anyone seeing him as he is.
I'll shorten it. The door opens. He's saved.
Muhammad comes at dawn. He opens the door
and becomes invisible so the man won't feel ashamed,
so he can escape and wash himself
and not have to face the door-opener.
Someone completely absorbed in Allah like Muhammad
can do this. Muhammad had seen all that went on
in the night, but he held back from letting the man out,
until all happened as it needed to happen.
Many actions which seem cruel
are from a deep friendship.
Many demolitions are actually renovations.
Later, a meddlesome servant
brought Muhammad the bedclothes.
"Look what your guest has done!"
Muhammad smiles, himself a mercy given to all beings,
"Bring me a bucket of water."
Everyone jumps up, "No! Let us do this.
We live to serve your, and this is the kind of hand-work
we can do. Yours is the inner heart-work."
"I know that, but this is an extraordinary occasion."
A voice inside him is saying, "There is great wisdom
in washing these bedclothes. Wash them."
Meanwhile, the man who soiled the covers and fled
is returning to Muhammad's house. He has left behind
an amulet that he always carried.
He enters and sees the hands of God
washing his incredibly dirty linen.
He forgets the amulet. A great love suddenly enters him.
He tears his shirt open. He strikes his head
against the wall and the door. Blood
pours from his nose.
People come from other parts of the house.
He's shrieking, "Stay away!"
He hits his head, "I have no understanding!"
He prostrates himself before Muhammad.
"You are the whole. I am a despicable, tiny,
meaningless piece. I can't look at you."
He's quiet and quivering with remorse.
Muhammad bends over and holds him and caresses him
and opens his inner knowing.
The cloud weeps, and then the garden sprouts.
The baby cries, and the mother's milk flows.
The nurse of creation has said, Let them cry a lot.
This rain-weeping and sun-burning twine together
to make us grow. Keep your intelligence white-hot
and your grief glistening, so your life will stay fresh.
Cry easily like a little child.
Let body needs dwindle and soul decisions increase.
Diminish what you give your physical self.
Your spiritual eye will begin to open.
When the body empties and stays empty,
God fills it with musk and mother-of-pearl.
that way a man gives his dung and gets purity.
listen to the prophets, not to some adolescent boy.
the foundation and the walls of the spiritual life
are made of self-denials and disciplines.
Stay with friends who support you in these.
Talk with them about sacred texts,
and how you're doing, and how they're doing,
and keep your practices together.
- Rumi
--------------------
This poem screams to me like a Van Gogh painting.
What is it to know something of god?
Burn inside that presence. Burn up.
- Rumi
And they said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the Scriptures?
- Luke 24:32
a vision
I laid down the other night, and let my mind drift. I found myself following a dream I've been having lately. I've been lying in a boat, drifting down a lazy river. A friendly boatman who looks a little like myself is steering. We finally stop, and I step to shore in front of my house. I was using this dream to create the house and life I want. I mostly walk around the house in a little bit of awe, paying attention to all the details, trying to fill in blank spots. Often times I will meet a sort of guide, and we talk about life.
This time however I lay in the boat with apprehension. I glanced up and the boatman had no face - just a haze of grey. We were drifting down a river, but it was getting darker and darker; soon I realized we were entering a cave. The walls continued to close in upon me. I almost shook myself awake, but I reminded myself that true danger is within, and I must confront this. I laid back down, and the cave continued to close in on me. We barely squeezed through, but once we did we stopped at the dark shore and I disembarked. Waiting for me was a guide wearing a hood so you couldn't see his blackened face.
I decided to follow him, and we proceeded down a passageway. Suddenly I recognized my surroundings from a dream I had a few years back. I was at the opening of another cave, and out front was a coke machine. In my last dream, a man covered with hair except for his piercing eyes chased me out of the cave. I wasted time at the coke machine until he was about to catch me, but right when he did, I shook myself awake. This time he emerged. We made eye contact, and I followed him down the darkened pathway. When we were alone, he turned and grabbed me hugging me tight. He grip was suffocating, and he started to completely cover me. It felt like I was in his stomach, and I thought I was dying. After a while of not moving, I realized I was not dead and decided to stand. I emerged from the cave a different man - I had become the hairy man. As I continued to walk from the darkness, the hair began to fall off. What finally emerged was a new man. I stepped into a beautiful suit, and I found myself at the base of my house - where I would have been after getting off the boat in my normal dream.
-----------------------------------------
"Their mind being whole, their mind is as yet unconquered, and when we look in their faces, we are disconcerted." -Emerson, Self Reliance
9 David was afraid of the LORD that day; and he said, “How can the ark of the LORD come to me?” 10 So David would not move the ark of the LORD with him into the City of David; but David took it aside into the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite. 11 The ark of the LORD remained in the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite three months. And the LORD blessed Obed-Edom and all his household.
12 Now it was told King David, saying, “The LORD has blessed the house of Obed-Edom and all that belongs to him, because of the ark of God.” So David went and brought up the ark of God from the house of Obed-Edom to the City of David with gladness. 13 And so it was, when those bearing the ark of the LORD had gone six paces, that he sacrificed oxen and fatted sheep. 14 Then David danced before the LORD with all his might; and David was wearing a linen ephod. 15 So David and all the house of Israel brought up the ark of the LORD with shouting and with the sound of the trumpet. -2 Samuel 6:9-15
This time however I lay in the boat with apprehension. I glanced up and the boatman had no face - just a haze of grey. We were drifting down a river, but it was getting darker and darker; soon I realized we were entering a cave. The walls continued to close in upon me. I almost shook myself awake, but I reminded myself that true danger is within, and I must confront this. I laid back down, and the cave continued to close in on me. We barely squeezed through, but once we did we stopped at the dark shore and I disembarked. Waiting for me was a guide wearing a hood so you couldn't see his blackened face.
I decided to follow him, and we proceeded down a passageway. Suddenly I recognized my surroundings from a dream I had a few years back. I was at the opening of another cave, and out front was a coke machine. In my last dream, a man covered with hair except for his piercing eyes chased me out of the cave. I wasted time at the coke machine until he was about to catch me, but right when he did, I shook myself awake. This time he emerged. We made eye contact, and I followed him down the darkened pathway. When we were alone, he turned and grabbed me hugging me tight. He grip was suffocating, and he started to completely cover me. It felt like I was in his stomach, and I thought I was dying. After a while of not moving, I realized I was not dead and decided to stand. I emerged from the cave a different man - I had become the hairy man. As I continued to walk from the darkness, the hair began to fall off. What finally emerged was a new man. I stepped into a beautiful suit, and I found myself at the base of my house - where I would have been after getting off the boat in my normal dream.
-----------------------------------------
"Their mind being whole, their mind is as yet unconquered, and when we look in their faces, we are disconcerted." -Emerson, Self Reliance
9 David was afraid of the LORD that day; and he said, “How can the ark of the LORD come to me?” 10 So David would not move the ark of the LORD with him into the City of David; but David took it aside into the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite. 11 The ark of the LORD remained in the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite three months. And the LORD blessed Obed-Edom and all his household.
12 Now it was told King David, saying, “The LORD has blessed the house of Obed-Edom and all that belongs to him, because of the ark of God.” So David went and brought up the ark of God from the house of Obed-Edom to the City of David with gladness. 13 And so it was, when those bearing the ark of the LORD had gone six paces, that he sacrificed oxen and fatted sheep. 14 Then David danced before the LORD with all his might; and David was wearing a linen ephod. 15 So David and all the house of Israel brought up the ark of the LORD with shouting and with the sound of the trumpet. -2 Samuel 6:9-15
i felt like dancing
I went to barefoot Blues, Portland's alternative blues venue. They play lots of new music - with genre titles like "dub-step" and god knows what else that I've never heard of. But the music was fun, and I was dancing exactly how I felt like. Purely selfishly. And sometimes that's not a bad thing.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
a sip
The wine we really drink is our own blood.
Our bodies ferment in these barrels.
We give everything for a glass of this.
We give our minds for a sip.
-Rumi
Our bodies ferment in these barrels.
We give everything for a glass of this.
We give our minds for a sip.
-Rumi
Sunday, January 2, 2011
quotes from Musashi.
As in the case of other adults who have forgotten how to draw, his mind would work, but not his spirit. Intent upon drawing skillfully, he was unable to express himself naturally.
The things people do on this earth, good or bad, are like ink on porous paper. They cannot be erased, not in a thousand years. You imagine that kicking a little dirt around will undo what you've done. It's because you think like that that your life is so untidy.
One's self is the basis of everything. Every action is a manifestation of the self. A person who doesn't know himself can do nothing for others.
The warrior's instinct was not to be confused with animal instinct. Like a visceral reaction, it came from a combination of wisdom and discipline. It was an ultimate reasoning that went beyond reason, the ability to make the right move in a split second without going through the actual process of thinking.
The things people do on this earth, good or bad, are like ink on porous paper. They cannot be erased, not in a thousand years. You imagine that kicking a little dirt around will undo what you've done. It's because you think like that that your life is so untidy.
One's self is the basis of everything. Every action is a manifestation of the self. A person who doesn't know himself can do nothing for others.
The warrior's instinct was not to be confused with animal instinct. Like a visceral reaction, it came from a combination of wisdom and discipline. It was an ultimate reasoning that went beyond reason, the ability to make the right move in a split second without going through the actual process of thinking.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
on the art of cooking
Art or craft is a question that has long followed me when cooking. I've almost always held the belief that cooking must be considered a craft - that there are specific rules and techniques one must learn to employ in all different situations. It occurs to me now, in my new outlook on cooking, that my cooking has indeed become art. I'll try to explain with the further explanation that, as always, my descriptions are meant as investigations of life. Whereas dance has been my most used metaphor, cooking is just as important.
I'm trying to decide how to make my views clear. I will describe the cooking process in terms of a craft (how I have up till very recently cooked). If one is cooking an item, you must always refer back to the past. How was this done in the past? What worked, what didn't? I know that I must cut the beef in a braise to regular sizes, so that they will all be done at the same time. I know that brownies take 40 minutes to cook. I know that meat tastes best with such and such amount of salt and herbs. To treat cooking as a craft is to cook using only this knowledge. It is to read a cookbook and follow the recipe. I find there is always a certain fear involved in this process. This fear is rooted in the fact that the present moment is necessarily distinct from the past - things are different, meaning something could go wrong. What if my oven is too hot? What if this meat isn't as tender as the recipe? What if my butter has more moisture content than what I used before? As proficient as I might become at learning the rules of the kitchen, invariably this fear underlied all my actions.
To treat cooking as an art is a different experience entirely. I think the whole thing can be reduced to one factor, but I will start by describing the effects. When cooking as an art, my prep area is often much cleaner, my mind is clear, there is a certain vibrancy in my actions. I am actually filled with joy to prepare my own sustenance. I feel connected to the lives that contributed to my meal. Rules and recipes are taken into account, but they lose the oppressive nature of a law. Though I rarely ever stick to a recipe, when I am cooking as craft, varying from a recipe implies either pride or fear on my part - "I'm so talented that I don't need a recipe" OR "oh crap, what if this doesn't work out?" Neither of these thoughts are the right attitude. Thus when cooking as art, none of these issues enter my mind. I am simply too focused on the ingredients and the elements of the kitchen to bother with such lines of thought. Most interestingly, when cooking as art, questions of quantities - be it time, salt, or the size of a cut - are not determined in the same way. I do not frantically consult my memory of the past to determine my actions. There is a quiet awareness of the whole process. Thus instead of poking my brownies and messing up the top, I may take one look, realize it needs more time, and in the next five minutes quietly consult with myself whether they are finished. When my mind is clear and I am focused, the answers to these questions manifest. A sudden knowledge emerges that such and such is so. This needs more salt. That wine should go into the pot. The brownies are finished NOW.
I've written about this before, but it's becoming ever clearer in my mind: to elevate something to an art, to use our true capacities as humans demands awareness. Full and complete awareness. This is not to say that the past does not come into play. I have to learn how to cook - how long something takes, etc. But this knowledge turns into something uplifting - it stands behind our own fully unique decisions. To treat something as a craft is to remain oppressed by the facts of history, or by our own speculative fears. It is this oppression that causes the fear, or maybe the fear that causes the oppression. Whatever the case may be, my intention is to follow the path of joy and freedom, never the path of oppression. And this is what my cooking has taught me.
I'm trying to decide how to make my views clear. I will describe the cooking process in terms of a craft (how I have up till very recently cooked). If one is cooking an item, you must always refer back to the past. How was this done in the past? What worked, what didn't? I know that I must cut the beef in a braise to regular sizes, so that they will all be done at the same time. I know that brownies take 40 minutes to cook. I know that meat tastes best with such and such amount of salt and herbs. To treat cooking as a craft is to cook using only this knowledge. It is to read a cookbook and follow the recipe. I find there is always a certain fear involved in this process. This fear is rooted in the fact that the present moment is necessarily distinct from the past - things are different, meaning something could go wrong. What if my oven is too hot? What if this meat isn't as tender as the recipe? What if my butter has more moisture content than what I used before? As proficient as I might become at learning the rules of the kitchen, invariably this fear underlied all my actions.
To treat cooking as an art is a different experience entirely. I think the whole thing can be reduced to one factor, but I will start by describing the effects. When cooking as an art, my prep area is often much cleaner, my mind is clear, there is a certain vibrancy in my actions. I am actually filled with joy to prepare my own sustenance. I feel connected to the lives that contributed to my meal. Rules and recipes are taken into account, but they lose the oppressive nature of a law. Though I rarely ever stick to a recipe, when I am cooking as craft, varying from a recipe implies either pride or fear on my part - "I'm so talented that I don't need a recipe" OR "oh crap, what if this doesn't work out?" Neither of these thoughts are the right attitude. Thus when cooking as art, none of these issues enter my mind. I am simply too focused on the ingredients and the elements of the kitchen to bother with such lines of thought. Most interestingly, when cooking as art, questions of quantities - be it time, salt, or the size of a cut - are not determined in the same way. I do not frantically consult my memory of the past to determine my actions. There is a quiet awareness of the whole process. Thus instead of poking my brownies and messing up the top, I may take one look, realize it needs more time, and in the next five minutes quietly consult with myself whether they are finished. When my mind is clear and I am focused, the answers to these questions manifest. A sudden knowledge emerges that such and such is so. This needs more salt. That wine should go into the pot. The brownies are finished NOW.
I've written about this before, but it's becoming ever clearer in my mind: to elevate something to an art, to use our true capacities as humans demands awareness. Full and complete awareness. This is not to say that the past does not come into play. I have to learn how to cook - how long something takes, etc. But this knowledge turns into something uplifting - it stands behind our own fully unique decisions. To treat something as a craft is to remain oppressed by the facts of history, or by our own speculative fears. It is this oppression that causes the fear, or maybe the fear that causes the oppression. Whatever the case may be, my intention is to follow the path of joy and freedom, never the path of oppression. And this is what my cooking has taught me.
In Rehoboth Beach
It occurs to me that I write too much; I say too much. My mind remains as undisciplined as ever, and I feel pangs of self-reproach. It is no use to write simply to say things. It is similarly no use to write when I haven't really thought about what to say. Many of my recent personal emails and last blogs have been abstract, wandering thought. I suppose that in some sense this is useful, but it must be much more meaningful to put my full intention and thought behind my words. I am going to let all my old posts stay here, but sometimes i consider revising and editing and deleting.
I find my mind like a wild horse - seemingly untameable. It reacts. This is not it's highest purpose - at least I don't believe it to be. Sometimes I think to myself that I am being hard on myself - that it's not really that bad. However when I watch myself in hard times it becomes clear that I am as uncontrolled as an infant crying for milk. Then I turn to good times and see opposite but similar reactions.
I am struggling to understand what my purpose is right now. I'm not dancing, and I don't feel like my dance is improving at all, but somehow it appears that I am learning what needs to be learned. It's clear to me that to control one's intention is the key behind any great action. In order to dance like I want to dance, I have to have that control.
I keep trying to relax the muscles in my pelvic floor. I can feel them tensing almost all the time now. I am able to relax them only when I'm standing or sitting still and with lots of concentration. I have been tensing these muscles (why?) to absorb the many shocks and movements in my daily life. This is causing my posture to hunch (Now I see that when correcting my posture, I am only fight against the muscles of my pelvic floor. These must first be relaxed.), and it's causing me to misuse almost all the muscles in my body. It means that I overuse certain muscles (IT bands) and almost not use others (glutes).
Am I a perfectionist to want to complete this education of mine before I take up dance again? I could be dancing more than I am. What I really want is the money and time to immerse myself in Pilates, Alexander Technique, privates with Brenda and Barry, workshops with Etienne. To obtain that, my mind needs to be clear, and furthermore I've seen the effects of hard training when one is not in the right mindset. What have I really gained from my years of training and travel? I dance a little better - it's true. But my dance is not elevated. My social interactions are not graceful. I am not a man of intention. To continue my dance training in the state I was in when arriving in Portland feels like trying to fix my posture without addressing the root issue of my pelvic floor. I remember coming across a girl who was having pain and clicking in her knees. She was asking someone for advice, saying that the pain had started in the past year since she started lifting weights. At a glance I knew that this was due to poor technique - her pelvic floor was tight and she was straining against her body. This cannot be the right way. This is essentially how I have been treating my physical body, and as always everything physical seems to be a manifestation of the psychic.
I find my mind like a wild horse - seemingly untameable. It reacts. This is not it's highest purpose - at least I don't believe it to be. Sometimes I think to myself that I am being hard on myself - that it's not really that bad. However when I watch myself in hard times it becomes clear that I am as uncontrolled as an infant crying for milk. Then I turn to good times and see opposite but similar reactions.
I am struggling to understand what my purpose is right now. I'm not dancing, and I don't feel like my dance is improving at all, but somehow it appears that I am learning what needs to be learned. It's clear to me that to control one's intention is the key behind any great action. In order to dance like I want to dance, I have to have that control.
I keep trying to relax the muscles in my pelvic floor. I can feel them tensing almost all the time now. I am able to relax them only when I'm standing or sitting still and with lots of concentration. I have been tensing these muscles (why?) to absorb the many shocks and movements in my daily life. This is causing my posture to hunch (Now I see that when correcting my posture, I am only fight against the muscles of my pelvic floor. These must first be relaxed.), and it's causing me to misuse almost all the muscles in my body. It means that I overuse certain muscles (IT bands) and almost not use others (glutes).
Am I a perfectionist to want to complete this education of mine before I take up dance again? I could be dancing more than I am. What I really want is the money and time to immerse myself in Pilates, Alexander Technique, privates with Brenda and Barry, workshops with Etienne. To obtain that, my mind needs to be clear, and furthermore I've seen the effects of hard training when one is not in the right mindset. What have I really gained from my years of training and travel? I dance a little better - it's true. But my dance is not elevated. My social interactions are not graceful. I am not a man of intention. To continue my dance training in the state I was in when arriving in Portland feels like trying to fix my posture without addressing the root issue of my pelvic floor. I remember coming across a girl who was having pain and clicking in her knees. She was asking someone for advice, saying that the pain had started in the past year since she started lifting weights. At a glance I knew that this was due to poor technique - her pelvic floor was tight and she was straining against her body. This cannot be the right way. This is essentially how I have been treating my physical body, and as always everything physical seems to be a manifestation of the psychic.
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