It is 14:12 and again the perfect time to start writing today’s Blog. I have just opened today’s Album by Ironomi (one of my favourite Japanese Duo’s who make amazing music), The Album is called Four Seasons. So if you feel like it you may listen to it while reading me 🙂
As usual I have been in the forest. Today's spring weather has been challenging, but the wind was refreshing. I was thinking about writing, and how I haven’t written anything for the Manual this past week. So some questions came up: What is the meaning of writing? Why are we writing? How does writing make me feel?
I had a lovely talk with my dear friend Jat Dhillon yesterday evening, and as he is a writer, we were talking about how satisfying writing is. Once you start concentrating on what you will write and you spend time with it, and when it is finished the satisfaction of this act of writing is incomparable to anything else.
Coming back to the above questions, during my walk, I started talking to the trees again: I am not a writer… but I write. And I write more and more but still I am not able to write everyday. I would think that a writer writes everyday, at least something, or tries producing some meaningful text.
I am a dancer, or more correctly I was a dancer, and I dance everyday. From the moment I wake up my movements are connecting my mind to my body and as I roll out of bed, each time I make a prayer in movement and stretch and roll and let my body say farewell to the futon and dance myself out from the dream world to the day. I start the day dancing. In the forest I dance innerly and sometimes even with the trees, then in the studio I dance, with my clients for a while, and in between, and then again when I go to bed.
However when I write it is not so natural. I have to take a lot of time. I have to think, and let the right moment come to me, when I can really sit in front of the computer and start writing. I need the words and sentences to mature in me before they take shape and come out through my fingers or hand (yes I still write a lot by hand using pen and paper)
What happened the past week, and why haven't I written?
I said that I hadn’t written but in fact I have, but not for the so-called Manual. I have for the first time in my life written a manifesto, and invited everyone to dance every evening starting from today for 15-30 minutes in order to do Prayers in movement for Peace, Love and Health.
I felt that it was needed and somehow secretly I believe in the power of mindful and conscious actions.
However I have been thinking about the Manual, and what should be in it. But still I cannot find a regular rhythm in my dedication to writing a book. I wonder if writers have this? Do you? Are there any writers out there who are reading me? And if yes, how often do you write?
But one of the strongest reasons why I haven’t written is the situation of the manifestations in the world right now. And because I am Turkish too, I am deeply touched by the millions of people who are protesting for justice in the current events that have taken place.
I think that everything we live and experience influences our process of maturing our thoughts. That is: when I am working on a book, I am daily thinking about it, I let my experiences lead me to new perspectives about the subject, or I am trying to stay available in my head, and most of the time something becomes clearer in my thoughts, or I have a fresh idea, or I decide to drop one idea or question it deeply.
So every week multiple processes happen, and they are also influenced by what is happening around me. While I was following the news everywhere in the world, I couldn’t help thinking how we came to this stage in world society. At least in the countries where a lot of people are manifesting right now. And there are also a large number of people in the society who are fine with what is going on. I was thinking or rather feeling that I am losing the sense of all that is happening. I can’t seem to make sense anymore of certain speeches, actions, sanctions, attacks, unjust arrests…
Of course a part of me says, oh it has always been this way. But then I ask, but does it still have to be? Do we have to go this far? This far again?
Do we really have to lose everything and everybody?
And here I remember one of my favourite writers Henry Bauchau: in his novel Antigone, he describes a very strong scene, where Antigone is asking one of her brothers, Polynice, who is fighting against the other brother Etéocle, if it is really necessary that they fight… “you are brothers” says Antigone, and Polynice replies : “...yes, but we have to go until the end of our madness, there is no turning back, one of us must die”
Don’t get too dramatic again B…
Yes ok, I feel the power of writing, and I can get carried away and be emotional and even dramatic… but that’s the way I am. Even in dancing when I am exploring a body part, still after so many years I can feel the dramatic impulse rising in my veins and the movements just explode.
As I write I just follow my erratic brain and can get carried away. I admit now at 24:03 (so it is Tuesday now) I am sitting here after a long break from writing. I wasn’t able to finish the blog during the day of Monday (97th birthday of my beloved mother-in-law, the first day of Prayers in movement and a lovely concert of Benjamin Clementine to which I was invited by dear friends Bara and Petr) …
But coming back to the “prayers in movement” which I had mentioned earlier… Güneş and I published the announcements of our manifesto and the zoom meeting that started today. We felt both that this could be a good idea to create space for peaceful action, and it was so.
Today we connected for the first time, and 26 people connected and we danced all together for 30 minutes, doing 4 prayers in movement accompanied by music, and each time with an intention and a physical suggestion. It was powerful, and everybody danced, in their space, at the same time, connected through the net…and we created a new net of movement that carried the intention of peace. Today we concentrated on peace. Tomorrow we will continue and everyday we will pray in movement. We will let our minds connect with our hearts and reach into the sources within us, these sources which cannot be taken away from us by anyone. Hence we have the capacity to dive into them. Maybe tomorrow we will be more, and the net will grow and sources will multiply.
Making space within to allow meaning come to life…
Now let’s think about this: I feel we can make space inside us, even in the course of daily actions, so that we can hear words coming together to create meaning. When we listen carefully and regularly we can even witness how sentences appear and create thoughts. When we are patient enough to wait and continue listening we can see how these thoughts mature and find the right words, and then we can choose to write.
The same way we can make space in us, in our body’s inner space, so that we can find a peaceful state of being there, and we can listen…say listen to music and listen to the moment when a movement is born, and if we can keep a clear mind, we can even witness how our body moves, and if we allow ourselves to accompany ourselves in the movement we can even find it meaningful, meaningful in its illogical way.
Then if we remember that these two spaces are actually in each other, then we can make dance happen, or in other words a “prayer in movement”.
Right now I am tired, but before I end I would like to share some meaning spaces of the forest, which caught my eyes today:
So maybe when we lose the sense in our life, we can remember to make space within us to listen carefully for new meanings to emerge. What do you think about that?
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