[mythicstream]

Beautiful accounts and parallels with the dance. Of all the arts I think dance is unmatched in some things, especially in transience and the power and kinds of beauty that are associated with ephemerality–flowers, sunsets, a rainbow. Unlike a sculpture or painting or poem where a hunk of clay, a brush-stroke or written-line remains, with the dancer each move is made and is gone. Similarly with music.

It’s reminiscent of the Tibetan sand mandalas, and their emphasis on the transience of, I guess, all relative phenomena and not just patterns of beautifully colored sand. I’m not at that level of detachment just yet—(i.e., not going to burn my poems right after I’ve written them). What I also appreciate about dance is that it virtually requires no equipment—essentially, only what we’re already born with: a body.

To me there’s something profound about an art not requiring a bunch of extraneous technology that really brings it back to the core—which you mention regarding ballet being about the core. And what’s been a recurring theme in this thread: the relationship between one’s true nature and that which is imposed from outside it. Like Parzival’s case shows. Tend the core and the outer will follow. Or a quote I like from Maharishi Mahesh Yogi: “Water the root to enjoy the fruit.” (i.e., if the apple looks unhealthy I’ll not go out there with a spraybottle and towel to spritz and polish it back to health).

So that core where the inner-voice, self, intuitive acumen, etc.—I prefer to put the majority of my chips on these, though perhaps at the expense of the outer, that outer technology like “Hey, I’m going to accrue some more of the character trait of patience today, because I know I don’t have it constantly and uncontainably pouring out from my core (which as I keep repeating, and mostly to myself, has its values)—but it’s not the gold or diamonds or whatever one deems as great treasure.

But the attitude does succeed in “pushing” open some doors, although the true inner nature, the core place, when that’s on, I think the doors are more prone to just opening on their own for someone who is genuinely in that place. Well, two very long days of carpentry work and fighting the zzzzzzs now, but wanted to respond. Great stuff. Will have a look tomorrow after work!