Monthly Archives: December 2018

THINK ON THESE THINGS

thoughtful black child

 

I do not have to get involved on any human level with shauris. Shauris are made by recognizing a wrong idea and then embroidering upon it with rumination, which is a constant return of the thought to a wrong idea.

 

 

 

When there is an idea you cannot let go of, when there is a negative something, perhaps a fear, that your mind keeps returning to, once you have embraced the possibility that something could be wrong, you are so frightened by it that you cannot put it by. Over and over again your body reacts to it, manufacturing fear receptors like an octopus spraying ink.

 

Think again

 

To interrupt any part of this process is to circumvent all of it, so let us begin with the physical. Begin with four breaths.  Inhale for a slow count of four, hold the breath for a slow count of five, exhale so gently that a candle flame before your lips would not flicker, for a count of nine.

 

 

If there is noise or distraction, take care to tune it out. Welcome the opportunity to exercise your ignoring muscle.

 

 

 

I hereby delete all causes of stress from my experience.

I realize that by focusing on them endlessly as I do, I am giving them all the life that they have.

Let me now, by my deliberate intent, deny these familiar causes of distress any of my attention.

I realize that this is an endeavor that will require some of my conscious attention, before I can relegate it into habit.

 

 

A mother orangutan with her tiny baby

 

 

So let me now turn the light of my holy, dispassionate attention onto each cause of stress that materializes before me today like a black crow alighting in my path.

Let me dismiss anger and fear as mere interference, so I can regard each cause as an outside observer, and be amazed at their puny, misshapen aspect, and amazed that anyone could possibly be afraid of such a tiny, broken, puffed-up thing.

And as I reduce each cause of fear to dust, I open a channel for new, helpful information to come in.

 

 

 

Nature abhors a vacuum.

So let us send out all our fears, let us consciously dismantle them, dismiss them forever. Do this each time one occurs to you. Show the universe what you are about.

 

Finally, brothers, whatever things are true, whatever things are honorable, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue, and if there is any praise, think on these things

Paul’s letter to the Philippians, 4:8

 


 

 

 

 

ESSENTIALS OF PRACTICE

A young girl, perhaps 7 years old, sitting at the piano, practicing.

 

It is always good to master essentials before going on to higher levels. If you move on to higher levels without mastering essentials, your work and creations will be randomly mosaic: here a flash of brilliance, there some solid workmanship, but the whole hampered by a lack of basics, causing a weakening, leading to a loss of credibility, a non-reliance in your product, your output.

 

Essentials are basics are key

 

We lose no time in reinforcing the basics, as much as we may think we are beyond them. But this is precisely how we advance, in music as in life, by consciously practicing the most basic exercises, by drastically reducing tempo, by lovingly examining the minutiae.

 

 

It is not the quantity of the practice you indulge in but the quality of attention that you bring to it. When you slow the music down extremely, when you are paying attention to every note, only then do you notice how uneven in texture and length all the notes are. But once having been made aware of this anomaly, you correct it easily. It is just a matter of knowing where the anomaly is.

 

And all it took for you to see the anomaly was exaggerated attention to detail.

 


 

Can you see how this might apply to all of life, let us say your work, your creations, what you love and want to see prosper?  This is all of your life.

 

 

Can you see how exaggerated attention to detail might also make you more accomplished, effective, deft, sure, and pleasing in every way?

 

What might this heightened attention to detail look like?

 

Become present in every moment. This is exactly what it would feel like if you came from outer space, newly arrived with no previous beliefs or scripts.  Of course, the very first thing you would do would be to observe.

 

Observe silence

 

As much as you can, as often as you can, and more than you are now.

 

Horses drinking water with background of Monument Valley

 

 

You may feel comfortable where you are now. You may have achieved a balance between what you will and will not acknowledge, making unconscious all the thoughts that make you afraid.

Unconscious, afraid, who needs either?

Remind yourself you just arrived here yesterday and are trying to learn all you can. You observe.

 

Newborn baby with wonder in its eyes

 

At the same time, you have a mantra, an inner lode star, something you live by, a sine qua non, without which nothing, a compass that always guides you. Otherwise, it would be too easy to lose your way; there are many distractions.

 

Let me have no other desire than to do good

 

A young man in warrior pose