CALISTHENICS February 1982
SENSE OF THE SCARED --- MUSIC IS A LANGUAGE
We are going to use this opportunity to to start a movement that can be expressed with the words: sense of the sacred. I introduce this because I have noticed that in some instances people were unable to adjust to what was going on, either a situation or a person ,because of a lack of a sense of the sacred.
I could express this in other words. The sacred is the key to heaven. Actually, when the sacred is alive in your person, heaven comes down. It is related to that awareness that links you to what is popularly called "heavenly action".
We have several difficulties: First, we cannot put the meaning of sacred into words because the consciousness is not sacred at all, not yet. If we put it into words we take the sacred out of the sacred, obviously but we still have to respect the sacred. Second, behind the word "sacred", quite unfortunately, is a connotation of church, or, in other words, routine -- then the sacred is lost. or possibly, you have a religious education with a sense of the sacred that is mainly, or very often only, emotional -- this means imagery that triggers a highly emotional state. We don't call this sacred. This does not open heaven. When the sacred is suddenly real for you, at least for a while, you might be physically, emotionally or mentally shaken, but you are shaken because you are facing the sacred and not the reverse. It's not the very strong emotion or big turmoil that opens the sacred, it's the reverse, the sacred might possibly release a higher state of emotion in you.
Today we plan to play Chopin as therapy. You will listen to the music in three different ways, and each way will have a specific effect which you could describe as becoming more sensitive, clearer, more refined.
In the first pieces we play, I will ask you to listen to the music in a way in which the music is the actor and you are tuned into the action. You are not the actor, the music is playing, not you. This does not mean that you lay passive, open, by far not. You are tuned to the music, you move with the music. Music is a language in itself, it does not speak in the usual terms of the mind. If you are tuned to music you don't interfere with the mind. You don't even say: "Oh, this is nice", or "I don't like this", or "this is beautiful". No, you let the music play.
Part of the training here is to just let the music play. The mind, not being trained, will interfere anyway, until you train it, but if you are truly with the music, or with that language called music, or with that action called music, something will happen-- maybe not the first time and maybe not the second, it depends on the clarity in you and of course your sensitiveness to music -- what will happen is that after a while, when the position is correct, you will suddenly sense the notes of the music running all over the body, feet, head, everything. A little later, it will not be all over the body as a general image, but in precise parts of the body, and then not only precise parts but every cell. It just happens and you notice it, you don't do anything to make it happen.
Of course there is a way of feeling the music playing, as a musician does, but this is not what we mean. It is not the mind or the emotions that follows the music and likes it, goes with and plays it -- this is easy.
You will know that the training is working when suddenly you feel being made of music. There is a level that is very little known in which creation is done through music, but then there is no sound.
Not long ago, I heard a musician say to his audience that it is not the notes but the space between the notes that gives the music its character. I found this pretty nice because it is precisely the nothing in between that gives the character and not the note itself. That man had some inkling of what music is. For most people it is the thingness , the sound, that is music, and only that.
So you have to be very careful not to follow the tune with your mind or your feelings as if you were playing it on an instrument, instead let the sound play you. You actually become alive through the sound, and the sound, having certain characteristics, begins to build those characteristics in you.
If you want to practice at home, therapy-wise, I suggest you use only two types of music: Chopin, which will help you get clearer and more sensitive, and Mozart, which helps your mind and your nerves.
The first position is the very simple one in which you let the music play you and possibly you feel becoming alive with the sound of the music.okay let's do it.
( music )
Now, as you can see for yourself, there is a difference in the room; there is a difference with each one of you, and you show more sensitiveness through your hands. If you feel the substance of your hands, they are different than before, there is a finer quality.
How would you express what the music does to you?
Participant: It's cleansing in the (sense of being washed through. But I didn't have a sense of it until the last part of the music.
Martin: This means it happens steadily until you notice it.
Incidentally for those who plan to work with music at home, you will need a certain time until there is really something there. You have to play for at lease ten minutes, preferably something like 20 minutes. You will also notice that if you play the music first and then work after that, you will be in a much better position. It will happen quite naturally, I would say nearly automatically, provided you let the music play. Don't tell the music what to do, the music has its own way of working and you have to respect it. If you have trouble taking a position in which it works, simply lie down and do nothing, strictly nothing, just let the music play. And when I say strictly nothing I mean it; don't get emotional or mental or whatever. Enjoy doing nothing, with no intention except to do nothing; let the music play, then stand up and see the difference.
Participant: Is any Chopin or Mozart acceptable?
Martin: Any. Except the pieces we use to work with here.
Participant: During the first piece my first sensation of anything playing was in an area like so (generally, in front of the aU center). A note would be struck and it would be like the note would explode in this area and a wave would wash in both directions. As we went into the other two pieces the change got more subtle and I lost the sensation of movement. Is that an emotional response to that play or is it a normal situation? Or does it matter?
Martin : I would prefer to call it a normal situation. When the music is more subtle and you lose the movement, be aware of it; it is your consciousness losing the movement. The movement is going on anyway, but you lose it because it's too refined or for any reason. If you happen to have a specific piece in which it happens regularly, play it doing nothing and see what happens at the end. It is a very good experience for the consciousness to see that something can systematically happen when the consciousness cannot follow. The consciousness believes it has to follow doesn't it? Specifically, in the more subtle part you are beyond the range of normal consciousness. It's simply in the long-range that you become more sensitive, meaning your range increases. Don't be afraid to play something you cannot follow; you do it with us constantly.
Okay, the next step: We will play some different pieces of Chopin and this time I'll ask you to be more specific with it.
When the music plays, the effect, if you have noticed, is kind of overall. Now, center in that overall on purity/ transparency. The experience of greater purity really makes sense for some people, sometimes more than transparency, but when purity starts living you always observe the greater transparency -- so they are bound together. Now, other people respond better to transparency, but there is a tendency to accept transparency as a mind image (as in a crystal) and forget purity. You have to have both.
Now there is also a third proposition: As the music goes on you live the unfoldment of beauty, and, of course, beauty is enhanced by purity and transparency.
You cannot approach the sacred without beauty, purity, transparency. If these live in you, you can easily live the sacred.
Live beauty and that beauty is expressed in purity and transparency. When you really live that you can see your instrumentality in a way that is completely different.
Also, if in the process of training you start continuously living beauty, purity, transparency, it might spontaneously happen that the usual veil is gone. It happens, and this is due mainly to purity which is linked to transparency. Purity involves a much more refined condition; it's a subject that is little known and little practiced. When you let Chopin play you, you feel more sensitive and more refined -- this leads to purity and this is able to lift the veil.
( music )
These first two steps can be trained at home. If you don't have a music facility you can live again what you lived here, without the music. The music is a reminder that makes things go a bit easier, but if you do it the hard way, without music, the results are quicker.
Now, for the religious music I will ask you to be centered on Christ. If you are sensitive to that presence, the connotation or value of what you call Christ will be different from the usual. From now on, adopt the habit of training yourself to be centered on Christ throughout every service. I know it's not easy because of the noises of the mind and so forth, but every time you fail, come back, again and again, until it works throughout the session. This time I won't ask you to be centered on beauty, purity, transparency, these are evident in what is going on. I simply say: be with us.
( music )
So we leave you to your calisthenics work. I remind you: If you want to cycle the Christ Impulse, this is highly sacred. Don't forget it. This is what you must start with. It's up to you to make this place a sacred place. Live and act accordingly.