Inspired by the invisible energy running through our world (that of atoms, quarks, molecules, cells, etc.) I got to thinking...
And last night, after debating the differences (perceived and refuted) between math and art and science the seed continued to sprout.
While trying to hash out the web of relations (people-to-people relations) that human life spins, I came to a visual analogy where molecular structure serves as the frame, the pre-existing, 'invisible' evidence of the relational quality of base to pinnacle (human, incarnate, life and its physical manifestations being the pinnacle. A pinnacle which is not necessarily superior to the base).
Now, I know jack about the subject of molecules et al as a scientist or studied chemist. But that didn't stop me from connecting the image of molecular bonds and structures that I could recall from my 10th grade chemistry notes to a topic, theme, that has been floating around for some time.
What is it about childhood friends (and family, of course) that ensures a sort-of timeless confidence in ourselves, the 'true you', and the ability of that trueness to shine forth unimpeded within that relationship? Is it more than just the temporal quality of that relationship that, my best buddy so-and-so who I've known since _____ (I could walk, the playground in 4th grade, summer camp, etc.) knows the real me and I know the real them? It's got to be more than time and innocence that does it, right? What sort of factors provide the bonding agents between people? Because as perfect and timeless as childhood bonds may be, there's still evidence to the fact that you can have those sort of bonds with someone you met only a few years ago, months ago. Or do those people, who you so easily connect to, spark a recognition of your own being in their behavior, silhouette, essence, that resonates in a timeless manner, that recognizes connection thanks to (a) shared 'atom(s)' that once existed as a singular entity and had been split and dispersed into other beings. Picking up the pieces of yourself, found in others, is that what bonds the bond? And makes life so rich with potential?
311 wrote a great song for this.
That home feeling. That love feeling of safety and comfort to let loose with another person within the boundary-less no-uncertain terms that resemble what you relate to most in life. What are those electron bonds that provide for the covalent connection? And how many do we get in life? What does one's personal molecularelationship bubble structure look like throughout life, with some bonds fading out and others replacing them...
And how do they overlap?
Ever make a 'hook-up' web in high school? Having attended a small-closely knit (ahem sometimes incestuous) high school and college, it was always a hoot to see who's been with who through who.
It's alllmufukinconnected. 6-degrees and all...
Thank you, Wikipedia...
And last night, after debating the differences (perceived and refuted) between math and art and science the seed continued to sprout.
While trying to hash out the web of relations (people-to-people relations) that human life spins, I came to a visual analogy where molecular structure serves as the frame, the pre-existing, 'invisible' evidence of the relational quality of base to pinnacle (human, incarnate, life and its physical manifestations being the pinnacle. A pinnacle which is not necessarily superior to the base).
Now, I know jack about the subject of molecules et al as a scientist or studied chemist. But that didn't stop me from connecting the image of molecular bonds and structures that I could recall from my 10th grade chemistry notes to a topic, theme, that has been floating around for some time.
What is it about childhood friends (and family, of course) that ensures a sort-of timeless confidence in ourselves, the 'true you', and the ability of that trueness to shine forth unimpeded within that relationship? Is it more than just the temporal quality of that relationship that, my best buddy so-and-so who I've known since _____ (I could walk, the playground in 4th grade, summer camp, etc.) knows the real me and I know the real them? It's got to be more than time and innocence that does it, right? What sort of factors provide the bonding agents between people? Because as perfect and timeless as childhood bonds may be, there's still evidence to the fact that you can have those sort of bonds with someone you met only a few years ago, months ago. Or do those people, who you so easily connect to, spark a recognition of your own being in their behavior, silhouette, essence, that resonates in a timeless manner, that recognizes connection thanks to (a) shared 'atom(s)' that once existed as a singular entity and had been split and dispersed into other beings. Picking up the pieces of yourself, found in others, is that what bonds the bond? And makes life so rich with potential?
311 wrote a great song for this.
That home feeling. That love feeling of safety and comfort to let loose with another person within the boundary-less no-uncertain terms that resemble what you relate to most in life. What are those electron bonds that provide for the covalent connection? And how many do we get in life? What does one's personal molecularelationship bubble structure look like throughout life, with some bonds fading out and others replacing them...
And how do they overlap?
Ever make a 'hook-up' web in high school? Having attended a small-closely knit (ahem sometimes incestuous) high school and college, it was always a hoot to see who's been with who through who.
It's alllmufukinconnected. 6-degrees and all...
Thank you, Wikipedia...
A covalent bond is a form of chemical bonding that is characterized by the sharing of pairs of electrons between atoms, or between atoms and other covalent bonds. In short, attraction-to-repulsion stability that forms between atoms when they share electrons is known as covalent bonding.
Covalent bonding includes many kinds of interaction, including σ-bonding, π-bonding, metal-metal bonding, agostic interactions, and three-center two-electron bonds.[1][2] The term covalent bond dates from 1939.[3] The prefix co- means jointly, associated in action, partnered to a lesser degree, etc.; thus a "co-valent bond", essentially, means that the atoms share "valence", such as is discussed in valence bond theory. In the molecule H2, the hydrogen atoms share the two electrons via covalent bonding. Covalency is greatest between atoms of similar electronegativities. Thus, covalent bonding does not necessarily require the two atoms be of the same elements, only that they be of comparable electronegativity. Because covalent bonding entails sharing of electrons, it is necessarily delocalized. Furthermore, in contrast to electrostatic interactions ("ionic bonds") the strength of covalent bond depends on the angular relation between atoms in polyatomic molecules.
A chemical bond is the physical process responsible for the attractive interactions between atoms and molecules, and that which confers stability to diatomic and polyatomic chemical compounds. The explanation of the attractive forces is a complex area that is described by the laws of quantum electrodynamics. In practice, however, chemists usually rely on quantum theory or qualitative descriptions that are less rigorous but more easily explained to describe chemical bonding. In general, strong chemical bonding is associated with the sharing or transfer of electrons between the participating atoms. Molecules, crystals, and diatomic gases—indeed most of the physical environment around us—are held together by chemical bonds, which dictate the structure of matter.Bonds vary widely in their strength. Generally covalent and ionic bonds are often described as "strong", whereas hydrogen bonds and van der Waals bonds are generally considered to be "weak". Care should be taken because the strongest of the "weak" bonds can be stronger than the weakest of the "strong" bonds.
Snuggle in for the second edition of Ma Bootlegged Book Club. But don't get too comfy because this one might throw you for a loop.
I think I'll sub-title it,
With a Giant Grain of Salt.
Now, that's not to discredit the writing, content, or author; nor is it intended to detract from the work. This book is, indeed, quite mighty. But I want to emphasize the grain of salt because it seasons the general air of the passages I've chosen to share quite fittingly. In cooking, though, salt is added not as a seasoning (good gracious!, no) but as an element to ENHANCE and bring out the flavor of your ingredients (meats, vegetables, etc.) and other seasonings should your dish include them.
So back to the book...I approached it like I do most things, with an open mind free of the eyebrow-raising associations that may come with words like 'magic' and 'alchemy'. I am still working through this one (and conversely, it is still working through me) but I found myself, in the past few days, quite staunchly wading through the content and felt the need to pause, share, ponder.
It's kinda heavy (in its totality). And her sentences can be so condensed and important at times that I feel the need to take a nap because, quite frankly, wtf? So let me just throw you into the middle of it now.
Tug-of-War
v.s.
All Roads Lead To Rome
(cont.) cutting, and radiant. It loves bravely, shrewdly, mightily, and magically. It has become the philosopher's stone.
The preceding chapter Living Backward closes with this...
What were to happen if these kinds of books were included in the curriculum of high school students? Or even college students?
There's so much more to share but my bootlegging can only go so far. I think anyone who were to undertake the effort of reading this book (growing by leaps and bounds) would be much rewarded.
With a Giant Grain of Salt.
Now, that's not to discredit the writing, content, or author; nor is it intended to detract from the work. This book is, indeed, quite mighty. But I want to emphasize the grain of salt because it seasons the general air of the passages I've chosen to share quite fittingly. In cooking, though, salt is added not as a seasoning (good gracious!, no) but as an element to ENHANCE and bring out the flavor of your ingredients (meats, vegetables, etc.) and other seasonings should your dish include them.
So back to the book...I approached it like I do most things, with an open mind free of the eyebrow-raising associations that may come with words like 'magic' and 'alchemy'. I am still working through this one (and conversely, it is still working through me) but I found myself, in the past few days, quite staunchly wading through the content and felt the need to pause, share, ponder.
It's kinda heavy (in its totality). And her sentences can be so condensed and important at times that I feel the need to take a nap because, quite frankly, wtf? So let me just throw you into the middle of it now.
Tug-of-War
v.s.
All Roads Lead To Rome
(cont.) cutting, and radiant. It loves bravely, shrewdly, mightily, and magically. It has become the philosopher's stone.The preceding chapter Living Backward closes with this...
What were to happen if these kinds of books were included in the curriculum of high school students? Or even college students?
There's so much more to share but my bootlegging can only go so far. I think anyone who were to undertake the effort of reading this book (growing by leaps and bounds) would be much rewarded.
Got caught up in a B&N last night and it seems that books are my sort-of polar opposite.
Magnets.
I manage to, be it in the library or bookstore, amidst piles and piles and stacks and rows of shelves, wander over to that shelf, pick up the exact book that addresses the exact theme(s) with which I'm preoccupied at that given time. Not just once. Not just twice. No, not just thrice. Mais toujours! Polar opposite, then?
Am I judging a book by its cover? Do the frames inherently necessitate the image that will be projected? And then encompassed, then reflected?
It would only follow, though, that as one creates more and more 'themes' or 'folders' in the hard-drive their corresponding examples in the world then 'surface', having a place from which recognition may stem, filing may follow.
A good exercise: never stop creating and updating 'folders'. It is a process that is entirely beneficial for many reasons known and yet unknown. Best of all, it makes you feel ALIVE!!!
Thinking about how many aspects there can be to one life, how many layers, people places things customs----infinity^ever expanded. That's the real meat.
"A magnet (from Greek μαγνήτης λίθος, "Magnesian stone") is a material or object that produces a magnetic field. This magnetic field is invisible and causes the most notable property of a magnet: a force that pulls on nearby magnetic materials, or attracts or repels other magnets.
(Systems of systems-esque)
Do my book-magnet instances qualify as paramagnetic, then? Liquid oxygen. Hmmm. Quicksilver's lighter, looser, little sister?
So anywho, Coelho published a new one. Brida. I can only hope and aspire to so artfully weave. I really wonder about authors such as he. What sort of influences did he grow up with? Where does his brilliance come from? The sort of simple brilliance that doesn't take more than 200 or so pages and leaves seemingly nondescript sentences tucked away in plain sight that later smack you in the face with layers of meaning and relevance. Again. And again. A sort of nugget-like weaving that is detachable from the original context yet makes just as much sense when it resurfaces over there. The smack stings with perfection.
"Anticipate the past. Remember the future."
(from a disparate source)
Let that one sink in.
wwwwwowwwww
From Brida...
"An anonymous text from the Tradition says that, in life, each person can take one of two attitudes: to build or to plant. The builders might take years over their tasks, but one day, they finish what they're doing. Then they find they're hemmed in by their own walls. Life loses its meaning when the building stops.
Then there are those who plant. They endure storms and all the many vicissitudes of the seasons, and they rarely rest. But, unlike a building, a garden never stops growing. And while it requires the gardener's constant attention, it also allows life for the gardener to be a great adventure.
Gardeners always recognize one another, because they know that in the history of each plant lies the growth of the whole World."
_____________________________
"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."
- Marcel Proust
like the Butter to my bread in life....
I manage to, be it in the library or bookstore, amidst piles and piles and stacks and rows of shelves, wander over to that shelf, pick up the exact book that addresses the exact theme(s) with which I'm preoccupied at that given time. Not just once. Not just twice. No, not just thrice. Mais toujours! Polar opposite, then?
Am I judging a book by its cover? Do the frames inherently necessitate the image that will be projected? And then encompassed, then reflected?
It would only follow, though, that as one creates more and more 'themes' or 'folders' in the hard-drive their corresponding examples in the world then 'surface', having a place from which recognition may stem, filing may follow.
A good exercise: never stop creating and updating 'folders'. It is a process that is entirely beneficial for many reasons known and yet unknown. Best of all, it makes you feel ALIVE!!!
Thinking about how many aspects there can be to one life, how many layers, people places things customs----infinity^ever expanded. That's the real meat.
"A magnet (from Greek μαγνήτης λίθος, "Magnesian stone") is a material or object that produces a magnetic field. This magnetic field is invisible and causes the most notable property of a magnet: a force that pulls on nearby magnetic materials, or attracts or repels other magnets.
A "hard" or "permanent" magnet is one that stays magnetized, such as a magnet used to hold notes on a refrigerator door. Permanent magnets occur naturally in some rocks, particularly lodestone, but are now more commonly manufactured. A "soft" or "impermanent" magnet is one that loses its memory of previous magnetizations. "Soft" magnetic materials are often used in electromagnets to enhance (often hundreds or thousands of times) the magnetic field of a wire that carries an electric current and is wrapped around the magnet; the field of the "soft" magnet increases with the current.
Two measures of a material's magnetic properties are its magnetic moment and its magnetization. A material without a permanent magnetic moment can, in the presence of magnetic fields, be attracted (paramagnetic), or repelled (diamagnetic). Liquid oxygen is paramagnetic; graphite is diamagnetic. Paramagnets tend to intensify the magnetic field in their vicinity, whereas diamagnets tend to weaken it. "Soft" magnets, which are strongly attracted to magnetic fields, can be thought of as strongly paramagnetic; superconductors, which are strongly repelled by magnetic fields, can be thought of as strongly diamagnetic."
(Systems of systems-esque)
Do my book-magnet instances qualify as paramagnetic, then? Liquid oxygen. Hmmm. Quicksilver's lighter, looser, little sister?
So anywho, Coelho published a new one. Brida. I can only hope and aspire to so artfully weave. I really wonder about authors such as he. What sort of influences did he grow up with? Where does his brilliance come from? The sort of simple brilliance that doesn't take more than 200 or so pages and leaves seemingly nondescript sentences tucked away in plain sight that later smack you in the face with layers of meaning and relevance. Again. And again. A sort of nugget-like weaving that is detachable from the original context yet makes just as much sense when it resurfaces over there. The smack stings with perfection.
"Anticipate the past. Remember the future."
(from a disparate source)
Let that one sink in.
wwwwwowwwww
From Brida...
"An anonymous text from the Tradition says that, in life, each person can take one of two attitudes: to build or to plant. The builders might take years over their tasks, but one day, they finish what they're doing. Then they find they're hemmed in by their own walls. Life loses its meaning when the building stops.
Then there are those who plant. They endure storms and all the many vicissitudes of the seasons, and they rarely rest. But, unlike a building, a garden never stops growing. And while it requires the gardener's constant attention, it also allows life for the gardener to be a great adventure.
Gardeners always recognize one another, because they know that in the history of each plant lies the growth of the whole World."
_____________________________
"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."
- Marcel Proust
like the Butter to my bread in life....
It only took 504 years, but it happened. Hieronymus Bosch may, finally, rest in peace. His triptych masterpiece:
The Garden of Earthly Delights
now comes complete with an audio soundtrack...
As a melodic and visual explosion of light, color, sound, musicality and, above all, important lessons from the Master of all Management, my appreciation and love for the Netherlandish style has been rejuvenated thanks to this modern-day incarnation of the busy biblical landscape that is The Garden of Earthly Delights.
It's Electric!
now comes complete with an audio soundtrack...
As a melodic and visual explosion of light, color, sound, musicality and, above all, important lessons from the Master of all Management, my appreciation and love for the Netherlandish style has been rejuvenated thanks to this modern-day incarnation of the busy biblical landscape that is The Garden of Earthly Delights.
It's Electric!
This is a mental experiment of sorts:
Wipe the slate clean. Totally.
Efface your possessions, your agendas, obligations, your job, your hobbies, what society deems as important, what the news feels is 'newsworthy', politics, the supreme un-equalizer: money. Picture 'your life' and all that surrounds it as a chalk board on your lap with those little plastic magnet letters, shapes, symbols arranged accordingly.
Now sweep your hand across it and scatter it all. Break it down.
Or, if this helps, imagine you are about to retire.
What is really left? What is necessary, important? What will/has actually sustained you??
We spend about 1/3 of our lives sleeping. Seems that dreaming/restoration is important. Waking life, bridging the dichotom-ic chasm-like quality between thought and action spins that web, the plastic magnets. So does family, friends, human connection.
But what are our true 'obligations'? To ourselves, to each other? It has been said: to love and serve, seems simple enough...Yet within that, we humans just can't sit still. We've constructed this world from nothingggg. Well, thought is something (the source of everything, essentially), but can't be held, touched, so in that way, it's nothing. What's with the need, the incessant NEED to create objects, empires, dynasties? To validate existence with something tangible, when we know (hopefully) that what is really important is not at all tangible?
Maybe we can't have one without the other?
We are here today because of a tiny little drive to life (creation) that has dually expanded and compounded upon itself, becoming denser and denser and bigger and 'better' as the generations progress...(Sidenote: it really is a tricky thing to assign value in this sort of place, hence the ' ') Passing on the detritus of sorts of physical constructions, economies of scale, culture, language- all the things, visible and invisible, complete and incomplete, that make human life as we know it today so incredibly complex and unique. It's kind of ironic because the fossil fuel we've been using of late (when did that actually start? Industrial revolution?) to propel our 'progress' is, essentially, compounded materia of eons past. Ahhhhh energy cycles!!!
So yea,
This exercise had me undone. Just a little. Totally emptied the 'purpose' of life (uhhh, scary?).
"Philosophy is a walk on the slippery rocks." Watch yourself. That moss, mixed with dawn's early dew, and some rain now too, it will have you trippin and flippin over your mis-stepped perceptions of depth, magic-eye crossed to pop back a twisted image of what's 'there' mixed with what you've got in 'here'- wait, where? When will the image come un-blurred, for sure, for certain death and taxes are the burden, both created and debated by the hand that dealt the first card, where I'm goin with this, that's hard to say, to see, in this together you me the world we's a team against itself goal keeper of the nets of constructed truth can't let all the balls slip through but perfect your kick, perform a hattrick times three, ooooohhhh then let it beeee ...
--random rhyme break--
I don't really recommend this if you're not in a healthy state of mind, on a psychedelic drug trip, or if you can't break out of the sweat of exercise. That wheel can spin really fast, depending on the angle of the hill you push it down...
The need to break everything down into nothing has been around before. The flip-side: death is there, chillin. But maybe it's not what we think? Death has caught some tough breaks...maybe he's really hearty and happy and sweet, the real fuel to life's fire. After death, no- through death- one is given the chance to come out 'harder better faster stronger'. Like the Mexicans who celebrate death, I can't help but be fascinated and curious as to what that other side contains...so annnnyywayyy. . .
Last late-summer it (the need to break everything down into nothing to get back to something) was launched by a 'manuscript' that, for me, really harmonized all the problems and potential solutions of humanity and life on this planet. I couldn't share it with people beyond a certain limit and being self-contained within the borderless, boundless structures (can you tell I love contradictory opposites when sidled up together? It makes things MAKE SENSE. Yin/Yang?!) of the profound meanings and messages revealed to me was overwhelming to say the least.
Where do you turn, what the hell do you do when you think you have something to help others (the world) but can't find the proper outlet? To start, you better step out of your own way, that's what. Ok ok ok, this is getting a bit sloppy. Changing the world- bahhaha!
Back to the exercise. It requires, first and foremost, a sense of purpose, important to note- NOT something born by imposed expectations exterior to yourself. Then, control. Oh control, you bastion of human will.
Hmm maybe using an example external to myself will help crystallize...
To preface this guy's hard-working brilliance, I must say that the need for humans to exert control over nature (don't fcuk with nature, fool) is what got us here to begin with. Loop, de loop.
"Once you have a mission, you can't go back to having a job." That awesome, quote-worthy sentence was spoken by Shai Agassi, the man who is working on 'an audacious plan to put electric cars on the road'. Ha, better: when asked if he's worried about a competitor stealing his idea, he stares at the reporter like he's an idiot. "The mission is to end oil," he says, "not create a company."
So think about that. The idea of a Mission. Once you've emptied the vessel of your life as you know it, can you manage to come back around and find what's left? The driver of a mission that, instead of adding to the misery of this world, helps clear it; one bigger in its solitude than all the combined bullshit that humanity has created around the essentials of life...That bullshit is comforting though. Maybe it has something to do with natural selection. We can't all have missions. There have to be executers too. Smaller branches growing out of the will of the larger ones, if you will. Everything will work itself out anyway, has for how many centuries??
Brings me now to Abraham Maslow who in his 1943 paper A Theory of Human Motivation extracted what marketing and psych students study as the 'Hierarchy of Needs':
_____________________________
"It's not so much where my motivation comes from, but rather how it manages to survive."
- Louise Bourgeois
This woman is 96 years old and has been creating art for much of her time. The Gügg's retrospective on her life and works was humbling and inspiring. Fantastic.
Arch of Hysteria, 1993
"Stemming from her interest in the physical, emotional, and psychological aspects of pain and fear, Bourgeois was drawn to the arch of hysteria as theorized and represented by the nineteenth-century neurologist Jean Martin Charcot (1825-1893). While working at the Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris, Charcot sought to represent hysteria by documenting the performances of his female patients. The physical tension of the hysterical arch - an intense muscular contraction, resulting in immobility and paralysis of the limbs - is emblematic of an equally extreme emotional state. Bourgeois makes this highly vulnerable position even more so by suspending her male figure from the ceiling. In choosing to represent him in an attitude traditionally associated with the female, the artist transgresses the social and sexual roles assigned to women, challenging the misconception of hysteria as a female malady."
In yoga, this pose:
"Ustrasana ("camel pose") is a very deep backward bend performed in a kneeling position. As a stretch it opens the whole of the front of the body, including the hip flexors and pectoral muscles. Traditionally it is seen as opening the "heart center". Many people find backbends difficult or challenging, because bending backwards is not an activity with which most are familiar. Practicing Ustrasana can make many beginners new to yoga feel distinctly ill, with lightheadedness or nausea being quite common after-effects. However, this does usually improve with practice. The posture improves core strength, spinal, hip and shoulder flexibility and stamina."
Wipe the slate clean. Totally.
Efface your possessions, your agendas, obligations, your job, your hobbies, what society deems as important, what the news feels is 'newsworthy', politics, the supreme un-equalizer: money. Picture 'your life' and all that surrounds it as a chalk board on your lap with those little plastic magnet letters, shapes, symbols arranged accordingly.
Now sweep your hand across it and scatter it all. Break it down.
Or, if this helps, imagine you are about to retire.
What is really left? What is necessary, important? What will/has actually sustained you??
We spend about 1/3 of our lives sleeping. Seems that dreaming/restoration is important. Waking life, bridging the dichotom-ic chasm-like quality between thought and action spins that web, the plastic magnets. So does family, friends, human connection.
But what are our true 'obligations'? To ourselves, to each other? It has been said: to love and serve, seems simple enough...Yet within that, we humans just can't sit still. We've constructed this world from nothingggg. Well, thought is something (the source of everything, essentially), but can't be held, touched, so in that way, it's nothing. What's with the need, the incessant NEED to create objects, empires, dynasties? To validate existence with something tangible, when we know (hopefully) that what is really important is not at all tangible?
Maybe we can't have one without the other?
We are here today because of a tiny little drive to life (creation) that has dually expanded and compounded upon itself, becoming denser and denser and bigger and 'better' as the generations progress...(Sidenote: it really is a tricky thing to assign value in this sort of place, hence the ' ') Passing on the detritus of sorts of physical constructions, economies of scale, culture, language- all the things, visible and invisible, complete and incomplete, that make human life as we know it today so incredibly complex and unique. It's kind of ironic because the fossil fuel we've been using of late (when did that actually start? Industrial revolution?) to propel our 'progress' is, essentially, compounded materia of eons past. Ahhhhh energy cycles!!!
So yea,
This exercise had me undone. Just a little. Totally emptied the 'purpose' of life (uhhh, scary?).
"Philosophy is a walk on the slippery rocks." Watch yourself. That moss, mixed with dawn's early dew, and some rain now too, it will have you trippin and flippin over your mis-stepped perceptions of depth, magic-eye crossed to pop back a twisted image of what's 'there' mixed with what you've got in 'here'- wait, where? When will the image come un-blurred, for sure, for certain death and taxes are the burden, both created and debated by the hand that dealt the first card, where I'm goin with this, that's hard to say, to see, in this together you me the world we's a team against itself goal keeper of the nets of constructed truth can't let all the balls slip through but perfect your kick, perform a hattrick times three, ooooohhhh then let it beeee ...
--random rhyme break--
I don't really recommend this if you're not in a healthy state of mind, on a psychedelic drug trip, or if you can't break out of the sweat of exercise. That wheel can spin really fast, depending on the angle of the hill you push it down...
The need to break everything down into nothing has been around before. The flip-side: death is there, chillin. But maybe it's not what we think? Death has caught some tough breaks...maybe he's really hearty and happy and sweet, the real fuel to life's fire. After death, no- through death- one is given the chance to come out 'harder better faster stronger'. Like the Mexicans who celebrate death, I can't help but be fascinated and curious as to what that other side contains...so annnnyywayyy. . .
Last late-summer it (the need to break everything down into nothing to get back to something) was launched by a 'manuscript' that, for me, really harmonized all the problems and potential solutions of humanity and life on this planet. I couldn't share it with people beyond a certain limit and being self-contained within the borderless, boundless structures (can you tell I love contradictory opposites when sidled up together? It makes things MAKE SENSE. Yin/Yang?!) of the profound meanings and messages revealed to me was overwhelming to say the least.
Where do you turn, what the hell do you do when you think you have something to help others (the world) but can't find the proper outlet? To start, you better step out of your own way, that's what. Ok ok ok, this is getting a bit sloppy. Changing the world- bahhaha!
Back to the exercise. It requires, first and foremost, a sense of purpose, important to note- NOT something born by imposed expectations exterior to yourself. Then, control. Oh control, you bastion of human will.
Hmm maybe using an example external to myself will help crystallize...
To preface this guy's hard-working brilliance, I must say that the need for humans to exert control over nature (don't fcuk with nature, fool) is what got us here to begin with. Loop, de loop.
"Once you have a mission, you can't go back to having a job." That awesome, quote-worthy sentence was spoken by Shai Agassi, the man who is working on 'an audacious plan to put electric cars on the road'. Ha, better: when asked if he's worried about a competitor stealing his idea, he stares at the reporter like he's an idiot. "The mission is to end oil," he says, "not create a company."
So think about that. The idea of a Mission. Once you've emptied the vessel of your life as you know it, can you manage to come back around and find what's left? The driver of a mission that, instead of adding to the misery of this world, helps clear it; one bigger in its solitude than all the combined bullshit that humanity has created around the essentials of life...That bullshit is comforting though. Maybe it has something to do with natural selection. We can't all have missions. There have to be executers too. Smaller branches growing out of the will of the larger ones, if you will. Everything will work itself out anyway, has for how many centuries??
Brings me now to Abraham Maslow who in his 1943 paper A Theory of Human Motivation extracted what marketing and psych students study as the 'Hierarchy of Needs':
_____________________________
"It's not so much where my motivation comes from, but rather how it manages to survive."
- Louise Bourgeois
This woman is 96 years old and has been creating art for much of her time. The Gügg's retrospective on her life and works was humbling and inspiring. Fantastic.
Arch of Hysteria, 1993
"Stemming from her interest in the physical, emotional, and psychological aspects of pain and fear, Bourgeois was drawn to the arch of hysteria as theorized and represented by the nineteenth-century neurologist Jean Martin Charcot (1825-1893). While working at the Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris, Charcot sought to represent hysteria by documenting the performances of his female patients. The physical tension of the hysterical arch - an intense muscular contraction, resulting in immobility and paralysis of the limbs - is emblematic of an equally extreme emotional state. Bourgeois makes this highly vulnerable position even more so by suspending her male figure from the ceiling. In choosing to represent him in an attitude traditionally associated with the female, the artist transgresses the social and sexual roles assigned to women, challenging the misconception of hysteria as a female malady."
In yoga, this pose:
"Ustrasana ("camel pose") is a very deep backward bend performed in a kneeling position. As a stretch it opens the whole of the front of the body, including the hip flexors and pectoral muscles. Traditionally it is seen as opening the "heart center". Many people find backbends difficult or challenging, because bending backwards is not an activity with which most are familiar. Practicing Ustrasana can make many beginners new to yoga feel distinctly ill, with lightheadedness or nausea being quite common after-effects. However, this does usually improve with practice. The posture improves core strength, spinal, hip and shoulder flexibility and stamina."Funny how closely hysteria and the heart center can be related when comparing Bourgeois' sculpture and one of my personal favorite postures. It's all about the context, I guess. But to reverse your view on the world by turning it upside down for a good 30 seconds, twice, effectively helps to re-focus and re-equilibrate. Maybe that's unconsciously what the bodies of those poor hysterical women in 1800 France were trying to do for them.
Louise got it out like this :
...but you gotta be a little off-your-rocker to really create, right?
