Exquisite artistry and profound healing of oneself and others can arise as one phenomenon. The ever-changing impulse at the heart of this is not something we “make” happen; it is rather a receiving. It can be available to each of us at all moments in all realms of life.
The discovery of how to facilitate this access developed from a lifelong devotion to an intuitive understanding– an understanding for the potential of art to meet the deepest needs of individuals and the deepest needs of the world itself. Over the past 37 years my work has evolved into a new spiritual/artistic paradigm. My students and I continually find ourselves in awe, not only for the quality of the artistic expression, but also for the spontaneous healing that occurs.
Problems from lyme disease to herniated disc to seemingly intractable emotional and interpersonal problems are frequently resolved. This is a natural result because this art is inherently, that is to say, by its very nature, profoundly healing. But the primary experience– the joyous sense of presence as well as the artistry– is sublime and fulfilling beyond mere words. I will try to describe something of this experience and how it is able to unfold.
There are infinite qualities of light, currents of thought, vibrational possibilities. And out of these limitless possibilities, God, being Logos itself, is able to offer us the exquisitely precise nuanced aspect that is optimal for each of us in any given moment. We can feel this thought, this love as ineffably delicate movement and vibration throughout our finely-woven inner tissues. There is nothing to do to make this happen….nothing to strive for….no effort to make. We simply sense our whole self and the space around us. With trust and tender-heart, we bring our loving intention to the Divine. We just receive. Our inner tissues become filled with ever-new ever-fresh profoundly meaningful vibration. Our movement has joyous ease, elasticity and effortlessness, and seems to arise out of itself, as if there is no gravity. Moreover, this exquisitely precise thought-impulse is felt not only as vibration within us, but also as substance surrounding us. Even sitting and walking are delightfully and deeply satisfying as we feel ourselves buoyantly carried.
These fine vibrations penetrate where words cannot– permeating all, as precise answer to our deepest silent yearnings. What fills our inner tissues fills the world.
With my students, I initially use my hands while they are sitting, speaking, walking, playing piano, singing, dancing…to gently guide them to this new way of receiving. They then learn to access this more and more on their own. This involves a gentle intention to come to the next level of ease, the next level of pressurelessness and in particular the next level of tender-heart– not only as ends in themselves, but simply as the natural way to receive an ever-changing impulse.
My work developed over the years through experience first; words and ideas followed. One of these was pivotal, and continues to be essential.
In the late ’70′s, a friend invited me to meet a spiritual master with whom he was friendly, Shamcher Bryn Beorse. I was not exactly looking forward to this because the “spiritual teachers” I had met up until then seemed to often just mirror back one’s foibles and inadequacies. Shamcher was the exact opposite. I remember walking into a simple living room, sitting down and chatting with him. Within a few moments, I knew for the first time in this life who I am. I knew this because I could feel the truth of my eternal being profoundly and palpably in and around me. The tender-hearted love and wisdom with which his presence spoke was the most powerful and moving experience I had ever had.
Shamcher was able to silently speak to the deepest yearnings and ideals in one’s heart in such a way that one came to both know and forever trust those secrets.
Where does this power to transform lives come from?
Shamcher was always in profound and playful communion with God. The key to the depth and power of this was, I believe, his humility, his purity of motivation. He had no need for anyone to know that he was the source of the grace they experienced. Yet he deeply touched lives near and far.
From him I learned the limitless transformational power of an unspeakably pure and tender heart in communion with God. This is something for us all to discover– in ever finer ways. My work would not be possible without him.
As artists we can ask in each and every moment: what do we truly want to bring to this world? Is it possible that our most loving intention, devoid of all sentimentality, can be effortlessly made manifest?
As indicated above, there is nothing to reach for, nothing to strive for. When we trust the Divine within us, when we feel and sense into… or ask for… that which is most meaningful to us in the moment, we can receive, as precise answer, an impulse– an ever-new aspect of the eternal– that fills us with exquisite quality and vibration. If our intention is to come to the next level of ease… the next level of pressurelessness… the next level of tender-heart… the vibrations become finer and finer and thus more and more potent and palpable. Our inner tissues become informed and enlivened in such a way that our entire system including our neuro-muscular system operates differently; we no longer have to “do” in order to move our muscles. Moreover, the subtlest prompting or stirring in our heart is felt instantly– as an ineffably subtle virtually simultaneous “call and response”. It is this communion or co-creation that gives ease, elasticity and joyous freedom to our inner tissues. Thought-impulses have no size. Our loving intention is quite literally palpable in and around us. Something new has come into this world.
This is what I call inner tissue presence. Our inner tissues dance and vibrate with divine thought, the essence of which is always love. When a person has inner tissue presence, others spontaneously feel their own– feel themselves moved within and without by their own true nature. Simultaneously, space literally becomes imbued with new dimensions, dimensions of qualities where unspeakably free movement unfolds: endless elasticity, palpable softness, among limitless others. Beauty, goodness, and love are no longer abstractions. They are palpable. They are real. They are manifest. If a quality is in our hearts and in our inner tissues, it automatically has qualitative dimension. We move in, we move with, an atmosphere filled with ineffably beautiful substance. Meeting another in this atmosphere is one of the great privileges in life– sublimely fulfilling, yet totally natural, almost casual. All feel delightfully at home within themselves, delightfully at home in this world– a world made new.
None of this is a technique, much less a trick. It is not real if it does not come from deep within the heart. Purity of motivation is always the key.
When we, as artists, are enlivened with inner tissue content, everything is given; there is no effort to make.
In movement, dance, we effortlessly join the energy of the quality of divine thought in the moment; it is in us and around us. This thought, like all thoughts, can be followed. It can be followed as a golden thread… a golden thread filled with substance… filled with light. It unfolds in buoyant waves… waves of untold intricacies, layers and meaning. We know immediately when we are “on the beam” allowing the new information to carry us, and when we are “doing” with our ordinary musculature.
In this moving, we become transparent…we feel ourselves carried by love. We are effortlessly carried by the energies of our thought and will.
Similarly, in instrumental playing or singing, we simply “catch” the exquisitely precise nuance of the new, and allow that energy to initiate our first sound. In so doing, all of that love, beauty and intelligence is given to us. It is given in the sound… it carries the sound… everything unfolds.
In both dance and music, the expression as a whole as well all aspects of music and/or movement, including: pulse, dynamic, tempo, richness of tone, and endless creative play… spontaneously arise out of themselves. Every moment is alive, fresh and new, not for the sake of being new, but because the source is an ever-new aspect of the eternal. The deeper our trust, the finer the impulse and the exponentially more beauty is revealed.
Our thought and will become manifest.
This art is always exquisite because it is not trying to show something, not trying to express something; it is rather, the thing itself. The immediate experience for all is of the world being created anew moment to moment.
Exquisite artistry, profound healing of oneself and others, and creating the world we want to live in– all arise as one phenomenon.
I want to emphasize that the essential elements of this are available to each of us in all moments in all situations of life. With inner tissue presence, there is a natural, almost casual aspect to that which is sublimely fulfilling. This is true not only in art, but also as we talk to the person next door, greet the grocer, and interact with our family and friends. The more trust we have as we feel and sense into the finest and noblest within ourselves, the more our inner tissues vibrate with exactly that. As we come to the next level of ease… the next level of tender- heart, the vibrations become finer and finer and thus permeate more and more into this world. There are no limits.
Conflicts around the world are often caused by a static and fixed concept of God. But God is not static. And eternal qualities need not remain “up there” in the realm of abstract ideas and fixed concepts. If you, for example, did not exist and in this moment were not sensing into or asking for something, that “something” quite literally would also not exist. That is, the particular way beauty or goodness comes through your inner tissues, in this moment, has never been here before. There is now a new nuance, a new vibration. I believe this is how the qualities that the world most needs at any particular time are brought into being. This is how cultural evolution occurs. This is what it means to create. This is what art is meant to be. This is how our own unique presence plays its inestimable part. This is a way God’s voice becomes known in this world.