((Non)Self)

I am barely beginning to understand a lesson from several weeks ago. There has been a long digestive break during which I chewed on, and exploratorily moved to, the notion of:

 Voluminous hip joints vs. delicate Kreutzbein (German “crossleg”) joint (at the intersection of back (up/down spinal river) and cadera (Spanish “hips”; horizontal and circling springs (of movement, energy, flow etc.). Both elements are crucial to a body’s centreline (i.e. balance). I continue to awaken to the acetabulum-ilium-ischium-pubo-sacral complex in new ways, thus triggering transformational body-consciousness and self-awareness. Of course, this is true of other areas of the body constantly on my mind as well. However, I’m not, at the moment, chasing those notions with the same devotion. I am clearly preoccupied with the whole body* all the time.

*I wanted to include the word mind. But I’ve come to the following conclusion:
Given that even the elusive mind must have a biological, a physical manifestation (the nervous system perhaps? though this is a perceptive system not entirely unlike other anatomical phenomena), the mind is body.

Am contemplating so many things, all the time. Thank God for Philosophy Sunday! I guard everyone’s sleep while I think in peace. Joy overcomes my wretched spirit. I listen to music and move words and body. Today I rest gratefully on my bed as I write. Had a bad night. The 48 hours of strong non-stop bleeding, the height of the bloody period, are upon me. This means probably two nights of interrupted sleep due to getting up every couple of hours to empty my menstrual cup, or change the tampon, pad, or rag.

I hate it when two notions cross like rivers confusing the mental landscape. It happens to me with languages, too. I get stuck searching for a word, an expression, a thought. Sometimes it is lost forever. Brain technology, what can I say? Totally organic. Thus, orgasmic. Thus, unpredictable and fleeting… There I go again losing track.

1. Surely bleeding females have had interesting ways of dealing with the moonthly flow of death all across herstory dating back eons. Before all the industry we know today there was fur. A useful piece of absorbent, washable animal fur cut small between the legs or larger underneath the hips overnight, or while sitting cutting stones; or, grass bound together, biodegradable; an other plants and natural fabrics assisted in cathing the unstoppable flow of female blood.

2. Sunday, Sabbath. A day of doing nothing.  On the seventh day: rest. A day for contemplation, for God to go beyond the binds of physics. Some believe that even flipping a light switch is too much work for a Sunday. Pray to God in darkness instead! A day to rest. Resting is a basic human necessity. This, humans have known for eons. Embedded even in patriarchal old testaments is wisdom true. Women must have come up with that. Anyone who cares for the young knows that hunger and fatigue greatly affect a child’s mood. It’s true for gown-ups, too. Nurture and rest are inescapable terrestrial necessities. It’s also what every woman requires at least once a month during the days of dying.

Two thoughts that now flow together separately.

At the same time that Father Richard (Rohr) was sending reflections about living with paradox, I was experiencing a lot of paradox of my own. Many more rivers of contemplation flow through my being simultaneously. I’ve been preoccupied with Siddhartha Gotama Buddha again, for example. A German book** which revisits the Buddha’s story as it’s told, makes it clear that Siddhartha had a singular goal of becoming enlightened. A singular goal of shedding, of overcoming all the suffering in the world, of living lightly*** to never incarnate again. But Buddha my love, you live on incarnate in me! And in the next flesh who thinks about you, too. Will you help us not suffer? Except, I know that he can’t. I must do it all by myself with my own pained effort, until it pains no more. Siddhartha took the physically hard paths of yoga and ascetism. He acquired countless techniques in terms of taming or regulating the body, nearly killing himself through starvation. And yet, all that rigor and near-death did prepare him for the sitting of his lifetime. He was able to endure the Asana that freed him. His body, breath, and endurance were trained. He performed the greatest art of perception ever. He attained something that is attainable to all. At what cost? At the cost of suffering.

On the dawn of my birthday, while being in a state between asleep and awake, I had the most singular sensation of non-self. I felt fully (my) non-selfness. It was the most beautiful, peaceful and happy (non)sensation I’ve ever felt. It was fleeting. It was a gift. And all I desire is to experience it again. But how? Following the Buddha’s searching path? 

Thus, I’ve been preoccupied with the notions of self and/or non-self. I am curious about the nature of a human species self. An individual self, or a singular creature, is already so very complex. But it is as complex as other individuals, or creatures, like it. And it is complex in very similar ways to yet other creatures that seem different. Thus, a collective kind of self must exist beyond the individual self, which is rendered non-self by that larger reality.

There is an idiosyncratic self (i.e. genetic body variation; individual experience; and so on). There is also a non-self, the reality of non-idiosyncratic biological (and particular) collective existence (species, material universe, and so on). What lies beyond that?

I’ve experienced another kind of non-self as a mother. I’m not sure what to call it. Co-self? Double-self?

Perhaps the self and non-self are kind of the same. There can only be a non-self (or any other variation thereof) given a self. For, what is not, cannot be denied. What can be transcended must exist. In this sense, to what extent can the idiosyncratic self transcend a collective, or species self, or a beyond or non-self? To what extent does non-self transcend idiosyncrasies?

Indeed, what is the nature of our shared humanity embedded in the biological and technological connections of a material universe? Who are we humans as a species?

Philosophy Sunday has run out for now. Worldly duties and other desires abound. There was more I wanted to write. Of course, hundreds of pages of notes hang in the making. My philosophical compulsions never cease. I’ll end with a note of gratitude. 

God bless the living! For, Nexistentialism enjoys great company. I get to experience some of my favourite contemporary philosophers live, for they are my teachers! The beautiful, intelligent, experienced, independent, and compassionate minds of great thinkers with loving hearts. Yes, philosophy is alive and well in the world. Of course it is! It always was. But more on that another time.

Image: "Calavera cósmica en el espacio exterior"
 de warzinx

** "Ein Mann Namens Buddha - Sein Weg und Seine Lehre" von Samuel Bercholz und Sherab Chödin (1994).

***to not suffer, for suffering is heavy and hard

Half Moon (in Capricorn)

Am recognizing past misconceptions about the spine, amongst other things. Samskaras? Habit patterns? Am attempting to rearrange, ever so subtly, lumbar* and thoracic** relations. It’s taken over two years of conscious study, practical effort, and countless lessons with great masters to arrive at this juncture. And this only after having crossed many more minor and major physiophilosophical junctures. These experiences are often nameless, the are only felt (in body, mind and spirit). Nameless because I feel a concept without form. Forms being words, symbols, language, structures etc.(in terms of anatomy (body maps) and beyond). Nameless because I feel what is formed without conscious conceptio. Body sensations manifesting in the flesh I never conceived to my knowledge. The question is, how to perceive one's own existential form? How to perceive what lies beyond (either way outwardly or inwardly)? A conceptual relationship of the self with an extensive manifest reality (nature) exists. And a formal relationship with "reality" exists also. Bound by biology, physics and ecosystems, forms inter-are. ____________________________________________

*lumbar axis exhale breath pattern (half-cow); pelvic floor, lower torso musculature "awakening"; hold inhale form (**) during cow bottom consciousness

**thoracic axis inhale breath pattern (half-cat) (inflated rib cage, expansion towards the back, upper torso musculature "awakening"); hold exhale form (*) during cat top consciousness _____________________________________________

Take a teacher’s lesson and find a way to study it - through questioning, contemplation, practice etc.

Dancers are philosophers. 


 Anyone who moves is, Anyone who makes of movement art.

The biological vessel has peculiar responses to the experiences it is subjected to, as well as phenomena surrounding it. This dynamic merits more examination. But there is so mucho going on all the time, that is is difficult to keep track of it all.

Every time he steps into the room I seem to lose my balance. How do I stay balanced even in his nerve racking presence? How do I not get turned on and distracted from the spiritual quest of liberation? Is existence indeed only composed of nature (i.e. hormones, biological structures, the manifest universe (formed conceptializations?))? Or does something lie beyond? And what is that like? Must conceptualize, must give form. Why? To live, to survive? What if what lies beyond is formless and deceptualized? How can it be understood from a place of form (beig alive, in a body, on a planet, a part of the physical universe etc.)? All that is not known remains a mystery. No mystery can be eternal, can it? Form conceptualized... formless concepts ... unconpetualized formlessness ... mysteries that can be solved?

Sometimes a teacher’s brilliance is realized in the repercussions of the lessons given, the effects these have over time, not necessarily in the moment of instruction. What carries over to the context outside of the classroom? What remains in consciousness, what travels through the unconscious? All input requires digestion. All effort (spirit) demands rest (organic limitations).

Are other spirtiaul scriptures around the world, in structure similar to the Bible in terms of being a collection of writings realized over time by countless authors and even more countless storytellers? Or do traditions with an unfiltered core exist, that have been carried over faithfully, consistently, obstinately from generation to generation?

Grauzahn Wilderbart (Märchenfigur) Greytooth Wilderbeard (Fairy-tale figure)

Prämens / premenstrual: cramps, heightened sensitivity, grumpiness, sore breasts, bloating, less energy, biological low (biolow/Biotief)

red, white and blue

Calor. Heat. Hitze. Just passed the Cancer New Moon at the height of summer. Went to a midsummer nightdream party over the weekend. Wore a fabulous short red velvet spaghetti strap dress. Braless. And tolerable black high heeled sandals. Even though they made my feet feel like blocks of stone on the dancefloor. But the breasts hung around freely. It felt good. A salute to Twentieth Century Feminism! And a nod of honor to Ancient Mothers and Grandmothers. "Always wear a bra! Even to sleep!" Warned my Mexican grandma, who had gorgeous breasts in her seventies. I totally undersand why female humans invented braziers. And I'm grateful every day. But oh does it feel liberating to let it all hang free sometimes.

Was in the mood for cold white wine. Had my gentle companion put in ice towards the end. According to my dad, white wine doesn't make you smell of alcohol. And if there's something he knows well, it's all matters "booze". Wine, liquor, beer and all things spiritus and demons. Father and I. We are a reflection to each other. One that is different though it appears to be the same. I had some sips of chilled white wine to cool the spirits. To lighten the mood. Or make it more grave. Take your pick! I know stuff because of all the stuff my dad knows. What I know is that the father line goes as far back as the mother line. 

Astrologer José Millán talked about Cancer in an interesting way in the context of all the transpersonal transformational energies facing the world, not least because of Pluto's final return to Capricorn before moving into Aquarius. Capricorn: father, social structures, institutions, working in the world, career, presenting outwardly etc. Cancer: mother, home, heritage, family, going within and being from within. He suggests to look at the inevitable changes (upheavals, revolutions, wars and the crumbling of sinstitutional society) not with fear. Cancerian energy invites to understand the family (in all its varied constellations) as a cell of society with timeless information. Eons of evolutionary intelligence with the ability to act as a force of renewal ever reinvigorating, reinventing and restructuring organisms from deep within. An inspirational driving force born out of individual collective intelligence. I do believe that this kind of timeless intelligence has enabled us strange human creatures to come thus far to begin with. I have faith that our cellular collective intelligence will renew the human organism to show up in the world not as fucking assholes but the loving beings that we were always meant to be. Why did we fuck up so bad all over time and space? God knows. This is a question for another time. For now, I am happy to revel in the holy inheritance of cellular intelligence that drives my organism with hope, dedication and courage into the ever changing transpersonal ocean of terrestrial destiny, as Cancer season closes out.

I have discovered assymetries and irregularities in my body that speak of weird old habits, afflictions and other things. Creating new customs through physical and spiritual retraining and refraiming is taking interesting turns. In a fascinating cylical fashion old patterns demand revisiting. Depression and foolishness rear their clownish faces. I laugh and cry. I despair and rejoice. Again and again. Yes, Buddha, rolling in pleasure and pain.

I lost a tampon that night. Let's face it, women have been putting "things" in their vaginas for eons. The physician mentioned that a patient once had lost a tampon while twerking pantylessly wearing a skirt. I had worn an undergament beaneath the red velvet dress.  And I hadn't twerked. Must have taken it out automatically when I went to pee, forgot about it and freaked out. My mother had Alzheimer's, I lamented to doctor and nurse. Ouch. Watch out for the symptoms, he advised. Yeah, like forgetting?! :@ 

Husband assured me that it was not Alzheimer's but wineheimer's. Remeber how you almost threw up in the front yard? No. Remember how you struggled getting up the stairs? No. Damnit. Sounds like Alzheimer's to me.

Years ago, after having birthed my second child, I was traumatized by a lost tampon. Suddenly a strong, awful smell. Gyno didn't take a look. Prescribed strong medicine, pills and a lotion, instead. Husband giving me eyes like "You bringin' home an STD (sexually transmitted disease)?" Dude, f*ck you. I wish I'd been... damnit. At least then all this theater would have been worth it. Eventually discovered the lost tampon myself while applying the salve three times daily. Had accidently pushed it in with another tampon. Forgotten about it. Doctor and nurse said it can happen sometimes. Glad I'm not the only woman out here with these problems.

Well, that I made it up the stairs almost alone is a good thing. The gentle man used to have to carry me all the way from the train station to the old Berliner apartment up three old flights of stairs. 

Another thing that coincided with the New Moon is the movement of the lunar nodes into the Aries (North) and Libra (South) Axis, where they will stay until January 2025. The last time the nodes were on this axis was from December 2004 to June 2006. 

"Welcome to the Carnival"
begun 2005, abandoned 2006

2005: Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Parents. Diplomacy. Internship. Choice for love. Seattle, US. Study of Fine Arts (Painting, Drawing, Dance). First home together. First yoga class.
Nexistentialism is born. First Nexistential Carnival publication @ Seattle Central Community College (SCCC) Women's Forum. Visits to Bruce Lee's grave, who I perceived as an inspirational thinker and artist. 

2006: Broken back (L5) from club dancing in red high heels on my 25th birthday. Goodbye Seattle. Hello Germany. Frankfurt am Main. Parents. Frankfurt an der Oder on the border with Poland. Europa Universität Viadrina to study Cultural Science (Master of Arts). Wohngemeinschaft (shared student living). Second and third home together. Hot, dry summer. German back surgery with flirty flower power surgeon ("If you sleep with the same woman twice, you're from the establishment.")

Checkpoint Now: Marriage (Libra), xy home together; pursruit of personal path (Aries), studying to teach yoga, training ballet (dance) and kung fu (martial arts) as well. Triverses. Maturing Nexistentialist. Still not sure what philosophy is. Wondering about the Gadfly of Athens (stirring up the town with philosophy) and the meanings of (eu)daemonia. Every once in a while there seems to be a teacher that passes knowledge directly to students, as opposed to, say, writing it down. But it gets written and interpreted anyway (i.e. the Bible and countless other arts). Just gotta be able to follow back the line to a moment of truth, regardless of where or how it occured. After all, the line is ongoing thus far. Except, it is not one line. It is the entretejido (interwoveness) of countless lines of interpretations. I made peace with Christianity and continue to study (South) Eastern Philosophy and Spirituality. In fact, I love the whole world of human perspectives, which despite their differences share so much. Anywhere on the globe. I love Jesus, and Buddha, too.

Triple Training Tuesday

Cancer season. High summer (Hochsommer). Long days. Moody moon mother. Approaching New Moon. Moody Monday. Monthly female biology taking place. First day of bleeding crying liters of tears. Yearning for dead mother. Searching for memories. Remembering Alzheimer's as a slow losing, detaching, letting go. This feels spiritual somehow. Makes me think of Buddhism, Yoga, Vipassana and Zen. Mother was a philosopher, a mystic, a spiritual creature. Why remember? To cry in the present and laugh at the past? If memory serves. Why not serve the present moment instead? Anatomical onslaught massaging the entire flesh with yoga and study and dance and more yoga. And a lot of activity at home. Duties of the house like cooking, washing, rearing children, and tending to marriage/partnership demand attention. Forgetting all the bawling from the day before. Thankful for the passing of another wave. The worst is over -- when the eye-sockets make waterfalls. The bleeding will naturally follow its course. The breasts feel less heavy thanks to training and brasiers. I did feel odd with them at ballet today. Then I try not to pay attention. But the body never stops paying attention. Now I know this. So I cannot help but look again and again. Look at the breath. Feel the sensations. Becoming aware of the inner strings that hold it all together. Oh, and there are countless strings! And we (humans) try again and again to paint a picture of this magnificent, mysterious and transparent body - individually, collectively and universally. Mapping the famously little known human body that is actually well known by all. Only if you look. But don't you get caught up with it! Except when you are training for the moment. For that moment, that one instant, no matter how fleeting, that flash of all-knowing. Complete awareness of the body interwoven with the threads of time and space, of fractals and movement and stillness threading through emptiness. Complete absorption. 

Iyengar says: "Repeated effort made with a thorough understanding of the art and philosophy of yoga and with perfect communion of body, mind and soul is not a mechanical practice but a religious and spiritual one."* What does it take to understand the art and philosophy of yoga - or anything for that mattter? It takes study. To look repeatedly, to search, to practice, to remember with religious fervor. 

And it also demands detachment. Iyengar goes on to explain, that Hatha Yoga blends the forces of practice (remembering) and renunciation (forgetting). Ha, the sun, is the "life-force, the seer, the very being". Purusha? Tha, the moon, is "consciousness, the reflected light of the seer, citta" (consciousness = mind + intelligence + ego). Prakriti and the three gunas? The three fates (Greek mythology) threading the destiny of human kind? Yes, like a moody moon. Sometimes visible, sometimes gone. Hatha yoga blends these forces, which are merged in the seer (Iyengar, 2002). In order to see, one must look. And on the night of the New Moon neither moon nor sun will be seen despite their presence. Purusha, why look at all?

Because if you're not observing, you don't exist. Since you have to see to be, then might as well study yourself until you realize yourself as you really are.

Llorando a solas en compañpía, asi te veía.

In company crying alone I saw you.

In Begleitung alleine am weinen sah ich dich.

Martes de Multiples Musas

Es la temporada de cáncer. Alto verano, Hochsommer en alemán. Los días son largos y cálidos. Launische** Luna Madre. Se avecina la Luna Nueva. Cambiando de humor el lunes. Sucede la biología femenina mensual. El primer día del sangrado derramando litros de lágrimas. Añorándo a mi madre muerta. Busco memorias. Recuerdo al Alzheimer como una perdida lenta, como un proceso de soltar y dejar ir. Lo que me parece algo espiritual. Me hace pensar en el budismo, el yoga, el vipassana y el zen. Mamá fue filósofa, mística y una criatura espiritual. ¿Pa ra qué recordar? ¿Para llorar en el presente y reirse del pasado? Si te sirve la memoria. ¿Porqué no mejor servirle al momento presente? Una avalancha anatómica masajea la carne entera con el yoga, estudios, baile y más yoga. Y con muchas actividades caseras. Los deberes del hogar como cocinar, lavar, criar y cuidar del matrimonio, de la pareja demandan mucha atención. Trantando de olvidar todo el llanto del día anterior. Me siento agradecida que otra ola ha pasado. ...

*Iyengar (2002). Light on the Yoga Sutras. p.62

** launisch - alemán, que con frecuencia cambia de humor 

Chiron

While being immortal Chiron suffered a painful, incurable wound. When he sacrificed his immortality he was delivered from his torment.
I think of the immortal soul sacrificing (temporarily) its immortality to incarnate (a body capable of experiencing pain and suffering), and wonder: Is the answer to suffering in the suffering itself? But how?
Could Chiron represent the journey of the incarnating soul who suffers in the body it inhabits while also still being an immortal soul? Does the sacrifice of its immortality represent the experience of death as deliverance from a life-specific wound? And to what extent does the soul carry a wound from experience to experience, thus making its suffering apparently eternal?
Does Chiron teach that suffering can be relieved through sacrifice? What does this sacrifice represent? In the story he sacrifices his immortality. Does this represent the sacrifice of the soul itself? Is this a zen-like reference to living in the moment? Before enlightenment fetch water, chop wood, after enlightenment fetch water, chop wood. Is the same true for suffering? So the sacrifice of immortality as in death, as in perpetual transformation, as in constant change from moment to moment, as in the law of impermanence. The sacifice of immortality in the recognition of the law of impermanence. That suffering, too, is a changing phenomenon, subject to the law of impermanence.
I believe that the apparently eternal wound can be healed.
Chiron teaches me that healing personal wounds does not occur by healing others.
My wounds are a great challenge in creativity. Also a lesson in patience with and love towards my own vulnerability.

Platonic Rausch* (New Moon in Aries)

Who retells stories so well that they linger for many millenia? Are these stories even true?

Philosophy doesn’t merely happen outside the cave in the light of day. Nay, philosophy happens already in the cave, where it is not a world of shadows cast by anonymous flames, but light shining forth from within each existential prisoner (human being).

Philosophy has often historically appeared to me as something Bohemian, a Rausch affordable to those with “time to think”, the leisure of surrounding oneself with certain creaturely comforts, like furniture, garments, pillows, scriptures, servants, art and so forth. Philosophy, a thing for the privileged enlightened souls who become liberated….

Liberated from the woes of the cave? Liberated from the woes of the day. Nay, philosophy is always happening, in broad daylight (land, air, surface water etc) as in the “darkest” cave (deep ocean, subterranean earth, mountain holes, human souls). The stars become alight in the cave in the form of organic shapes painted by eyes of fire. What about the atoms of light everywhere, and the shadows of atoms in light? Yin Yang anyone? Is there such a thing as “pure” light (Heaven) or no shadows (Nirvana)? For there to be shadows, there must be light. Is light not a matter of the physical world after all? What lies beyond light, darkenss and shadows is what I want to know. Beyond inside and outside galactic, terrestrial and existential caves. What awaits the seeker who makes it there?

But why listen to this proletarian-bougie turn-of-the-twenty-first-century sexually mature middle-aged woman posing as a contemporary philospher? One who suffers from ADHDD - Attenteion Deficit Hyperactivity Depressive Disorder. To use contemporary terminology...

Biological Context

I've been bleeding periodically for 30 years. My first blood dropped when I was twelve. For decades now my body with moonthly imprecision will oscillate between creation and destruction. It builds up matter for growing a temporary organ to build entire organisms and in a matter of days destroys the whole damn thing and expulses it violently, bloodily from myself. To then hyperactively rebuild and seek with sexual and other sensual impulses fertil ground. To then depress in the heaviness and flow of the lightest and darkest of blood. And this in a matter of weeks every month for decades. Again and again and again and again. A short-interval long-term pendulum swinging between uppity creative energy and intense inevitable destructive force.

I'm obviously ovulating now. How fitting for the beginning of spring with a New Moon in Aries. I am afflicted with every-man-could-make-me-turn-my-head energy. Sure, homosexuality and bisexuality might arouse me. But there is nothing in the world that fascinates me more than men, drawing me in with a magnetic force unrivaled by reason. Particularly those of my generation, kindred men. I seek to see them, know them, only to never fully understand them and remain a woman lost in the exhilarating beauty of their mystery. I am convinced this is a biological disposition of the wise and foolish organism I inahbit. This biological context must be further explored. In the meantime, a shorty I wrote a while back, an ode to men:

Imagined Joy I saw a half-naked runner as I drove the children to their class but I felt too depressed to care. Then I thought: "Better look at him than feel the shit pain." As I glanced back at him he appeared to touch his face self-consciously. "Why run around like that and expect not to get looked at?" I wondered compulsively. I would have loved to see his cock and balls bounce around as he ran.

Psychological Context

I grew up with an alcoholic father who loved to hate me. A mother who adored me as a mirculous first-born because she had lost two children before. I was hugging whiskey and cognac bottles before I had learned to crawl in smokey appartments rubbing cigarettes and tobacco between my baby hands. Got drunk for the first time when I was five. ... I just thought of a meme I saw recently, which states: "Ah, the 80s... when a kid would blow our their birthday candles over top of an ashtray, a foot away from an open beer, while someone held a lit cigar next to their face."

Now I must abruptly conclude this unfinished post. Motherly and domestic duties abound. Later, ballet. Body-mind entering a new phase in mid-life transformational development through study and training. More on this later.

To be continued ...

Thank you New Moon in Aries for the vibes of initiation, initiative, assertive action and brutal honesty!

*Rausch - German for frenzy, intoxication, rapture, exhilaration, rush ...

Bloody Passion

Bloody Martian Full Moon,
how my body aligns with you this day.
I am not who I was
as I bleedeth away.

Been experiencing creative compulsion lately. Must be the energy of Mars in Gemini (action in words, assertive communication, active formulation etc). Been experiencing philosophy as the art of expression.

Interesting that after ovulating around the New Moon this cycle, my intensive bleeding coincides with the Full Moon (today), which like Mars also is in Gemini. Which means that the Sun is in Sagittarius, the sign said to favour philosophy per se. I'm very much in tune again with the fact that philosophy is my passion.

It is clear to me now, that the philosophical path of passion was inevitably going to lead to the serious study of yoga. Out of ancient India has sprung the highest* "thinking" (for, in Yoga and Vipassana "doing" is key), as well as the most intricate, straight-forward and profound no-bullshit philosophy impacting the entire world. One embedded in the very body that serves as the vessel for existential experiencing. *(high/haute (French) = challenging = requiring great effort consistently and singular focus, complete absorption, samadhi)

My philosophical passion, amongst other things (such as artistic expression and joie de move**), seems to also have inevitably led to the study of haute dance, i.e. ballet, as well as martial arts, i.e. kung fu. Of course, these disciplines all have ancient wisdom embedded in their continuous movement practices carrying on for centuries and millennia to this very day. I'll get into that on another occasion. **(joy of moving; joie de vivre = joy of living)

For the very body is scripture and its language is movement. In playing movement archaeology, I’ve stumbled upon the body’s ability to reveal ancient wisdom, of human and even sub-cellular living dating back eons. Wisdom ropedancing on timeless, immeasurable existential spirals.

Jump at your leisure onto the carrousels and roller coasters that have no beginning and no end! Welcome to the Nexistential Carnival!

While playing movement archaeology, I’ve thought about ancient Greece and ancient Egypt. I think about classical "Western" philosophy and wonder how it may have been experienced on a daily basis. Were there schools with baths and gyms for physical philosophy practice, not merely mental activity, study, dialogue and debate?

I've felt-thought*** about classical sculptures, Hellenistic art, for example. And not only those, but sculptures throughout the centuries. They can reveal so much about the practical philosophers and existential artists of those days. Profound ordinary individuals unnamed with an extraordinary devotion to training, to exploring the very tangible physical and mental creative extents of the human form, and the countless possibilities for existing as the complex convolution of tentacles that is the human gown. Always extending and contracting, reaching, searching, tracking. ***(feel-think = a sensation beyond the fleeting notion of a mere thought, but a more organic all-encompassing sensation felt also in the flesh, organs and bones etc)

Yes, ordinary people exercising practical philosophy and spiritual devotion to the physical, to the art of perception, to conscious co-creation and artistic expression. Ordinary people dedicated to philosophically refining the physical and redefining what it means to exist in human terms. I think for example of

Those with the athletic prowess
to pose
for hours,
days, weeks, months
for a sculptor
to carve
human prose.

And the first philosopher was who? The one lonely micro-organic creature to reach for something beyond its cave of individual existence towards an unknown knowing of another. And in merging together two create the light of exploration into the creative complexities of countless possibilities and multiple realities of what we've come to identify as "life". For there is only life in co-existing, inter-being, isn't there? Individuality, singularity and isolation are playful fallacies.

Years ago, while living in Switzerland, I had reached a level in my training that made me feel empowered on my bloodiest day. I was moving through an intense Tae Bo class, bleeding through the tampon and filling up every corner of the thick pad. I could smell blood mixed with the sweat dripping from my pores and soaking up my clothes. I didn't feel embarrassed nor ashamed. Perhaps a little self-conscious about the people closest to me and the trainer walking by, wondering whether they, too, might sense the iron scent of fresh, raw blood. Mostly though, I felt empowered, alive, fierce and unstoppable.

I haven't reached that point in my training yet. Will I ever again? I wonder. Maybe when I've packed some serious muscle mass and regained full strength particularly in my mid-section. Which took a brutal beating birthing baby number three and her larger-than-life pregnancy. It's been just over six years since this inevitably traumatic experience with lasting repercussions. Sophia weighed 4.5 kg, was unable to turn her head, and came out face down, like a turtle, with her shoulders and body ripping through the birth canal and bumping into all that surrounds it. I quit working out due to injury and other life-changing circumstances. Focused mainly on motherhood. Reclaiming my body has been slow – Sophia breast-fed for 3 years. But over time, I believe I can regain full force. And better than ever before because I've never trained like this (consciously, curiously, ancestrally). Body-mind work has acquired an entirely new dimension since I seriously began studying yoga almost two years ago. It's reverberated into the way I learn ballet. And the martial arts component has opened another intense door of human experiencing and body-mind analysis. It's a hell of climb to be sure. Interrupted by the duties of motherhood, the responsibilities of being a member of society and the limitations of an aging body.

But hey, Sisyphus (Greek mythology) never gave up either now did he? And he managed to cheat death. Actually though, that was the reason he was condemned to push a boulder up a hill for all eternity – in hell, nonetheless. Just as Sisyphus would reach the top, the boulder would roll back down, and he would have to start all over again. He was punished with a perpetual grind. I’ve experienced training in this Sisyphean way. Train and gain. Don't train, lose. Perhaps over time with patience and persistence strengthening habits can be formed and a longevity of effort achieved.

What do I have to lose anyway? Walking on the road of being human is to die a little every day. I certainly die once every cycle when the blood flows freely from my mortal body.

Nude awakening

Awakening of the forest, Paul Delvaux, 1939

Human nature: can't dismiss it just because we've misbehaved as humans.
Hot-cold: good for circulation. I spent a good 20 minutes in the sauna at the gym and sweat like a waterfall. In the showers I did my usual ice-cold rinse-off with the hose of ice. There is something primal about this intense heat-cold-experience. I think about the Earth and it's climatic cycles. Dinosaurs - Ice-Age, summer - winter, desert - glacier. A desert at night can become very cold. A glacier will melt when it's hot. Rivers dry out and rivers are born. So I try to appeal to this primal part of my biological memory and re-memory living in an ice-age as well as coming from heat (think star energy, the sun, mating season).

I conclude that human nature is very vast and, sure, we make mistakes along the way. At heart we got the right idea. Love and faith in this love have brought us thus far - for a reason. What is love? Unity, union, communion, community. Entertain for a moment a thought of 'primal love', as in: mating. Does it evolved become love for pleasure? The promise of pleasure certainly enhances the chances for mating.

Mating is heat-generating. On the other extreme, death is cold. Life-making is heat-generating. Think animals, plants; think frogs, fish, ants; think spiders, bees, birds, flowers; think mating dinosaurs; think mammals, rabbits mice, rats, lice. Get the picture? Think even microscopic cells. They get close to get on going. A cell can become a union of two, four, eight and so forth more cells. They mesh and merge: an inter-change. Or as a wise man would say, they inter-are. They change, evolve, develop to suit the demands of life. Life is movement. Ok?

Primal love: mating: union, communion: together to go on, like, together we're strong. Think fungi, trees in a forest. So, that's basic. Each cell in an organism has stored this, one of many things, of course. We're merely entertaining a thought in a universe of possibilities. Heat means movement, life. On the other hand, think of the ice as a preserver of life. And what about empty space in atoms, grey matter in the brain, dark matter in space? Is life in atoms the little proton, neutron, electron balls generating heat? Or is the empty space like the ice the one to preserve this spark of life?

Coginitive Insanity

Haunted by a word „Nietzsche“ . . . “Nietzsche” floats around in my brain. Even the English autocorrect on the laptop is programmed for it. But what does it mean? Never even read the man, yes, learned of him and his ideas: a reoccurring presence in my mental airspace, sure. Ein Wolkenbild, a cloudy image in my mind. But is it easy to miss the sky when I’m stuck on the ground. I have vehemently rejected schools of thought perhaps in an attempt to find my own way in this existential carnival we call life.

And I get so amped up sometimes. It often precedes a creative burst. This manifestation of soul material can adopt many forms -  does it adapt to different environments? Personal experience says it does. How do different environments shape these forms of individual expression? I think about how hard it is to be around my parents sometimes, especially my father. Due to a life time of conflicts in his presence my individual expression finds itself yes tainted by strong untamed emotions especially given specific triggers such as a particular attitude or word.  And I wonder, but how do you tame love? For it is an undeniable fact that I profoundly love my parents.

How can I re-adapt to an environment which has habituated me to certain responses which are no longer favorable? Can I be around my parents for example without partaking in the same conflicts that have characterized our relationship? Do I still crave their approval? Am I still at odds with their different points of view? I am used to feeling a certain way about it which affects my responses today. I can get angry and frustrated. How can they not see things? Well they don't. So how do I integrate my new knowledge, innovative traits, in this old environment? Is there something in myself I can fall back on?

I think about the rudimentary organs Darwin talks about: remnants of another evolutionary stage in which traits were required given certain environmental conditions. Rudimentary traits such as various muscles in the human body, the hand for example, are no longer used though still present.  If at some point in the human evolutionary chain our forebears used heavy clubby tools on a daily basis their hands needed muscles unlike hands used to keyboards or remote controls. The presence of such rudimentary features reveal to us something about the living conditions at other times and today enable us for that kind of work even if we don't carry it out. I think of yoga and discovering muscles I didn’t think were there. So is re-adapting to the same environment possible given another approach? Given the development of other traits – whether this means reviving neglected abilities or innovating present habits.

Of the body and the mind

Du corps et de l'esprit, del cuerpo y ... ¿del alma? ... quiero decir de la mente, von Körper und Geist. Also: mind, esprit, mente, Geist viz. soul, ame, alma, Seele ... quiero decir mente, mind, Geist, esprit. I wanna talk about movement and intellect, about dance and erudition.

Un dimanche aprés-midi sur l'ile de la Grande Jatte
Georges Seurat, 1884-1886

What is the woman on a walk with a child in that post-Impressionist painting thinking? What do women think about when they're out walking with the kids? I thought about the body and the mind today. My boy stopped and wanted to ride in the stroller, where his younger sister was riding. "You are built to walk, son," I said to him, "that's why you have legs and feet, now come let's go on." He thought for a minute, I believe he understood. He walked the rest of the way without another word about it. We came to a neighbourhood wall he wanted to climb onto and walk on it. I told him: "Go ahead, if you want to, you know how." He's used to holding Father's or Mother's hand. But I was set on keeping ahead. From our home to my parents' house on foot with a stroller, kids and a canine: roughly an hour. We don't own car, otherwise it would only be about a 5 minute drive. Unbelievable! So he climbs up on the wall and walks on it just fine until he remembers that he is on his own, I suppose, because he starts whining about not wanting to go on his own. "Mami help." "You're doing it just fine, you see!" I reassure him without stopping myself, always an eye on him though. I did hold his hand for the jump down upon his request, I know he still may be too small to master it safely.  He 'd just never walked alone on the wall before, didn't know he could do it. The next walls he would look at and touch, but he never asked to walk on them nor made any attempt to do so on his own. He'll probably sleep on it a night or more. Perhaps he'll pass these neighbourhood walls in contemplative silence many a time again until he realizes that he can do it by himself just fine...pensive, careful and analytical as he is. And when he's ready, he'll just go for it.

I thought about about my intellectual progress in terms of my progress in the dance aerobics class I attend Thrusday evenings. The desire to dance is a matter of passion to me. I know my body is not ready, I'm working little by little towards getting it ready to dance full soul. I recognize my limitations in my inability to coordinate isolated movements of different body parts, in concentrating on counting through the rhythm, in flowing with the music, in letting the breathing just happen, to relax and simply allow for flow to happen - as opposed to hold it in ardent concentration-, in letting movement to movement flow naturally, in tripping over poor posture habits and the like, in being stiff and unable to loosely allow certain body parts etc. Muscles take time to develop and regenerate, so do cognitive paths. Ain't the youngest body in the bunch I got neither! But I still got time. And if not this time next life-time, right? **conspicuous lifting of the eybrows with a smile in the blink of an eye** Anywhoo, development is time-consuming. The brain, the body, yes the mind -biologically, the brain- takes time to assimilate new knowledge, rid itself of unnecessary information and heal from acquired afflictions. I'm the piggy with the brickhouse, well I'm still haulin' bricks, but one day it'll be a house...and I'll surely keep going until it is :) for there is beauty in faith, perseverance, discipline and regeneration.