From longing in loss, to love's presence shared

This writing came out of a discussion around the dance Thalassa. A song of loss and longing that has a circle dance which has remained popular over many years.

I have a songsheet with translation HERE (pdf) - and a version of the song can be heard HERE


The theme of separation from love - as a disconnected longing that persists in bittersweet dreaming amidst an absence of loving is surely one of the most universal human archetypical expressions.

I am reminded of a Rumi poem that points the way out of dreaming on lost love - (at least to me it does!)

"God picks up the reed-flute world and blows.  Each note is a need coming
through one of us, a passion, a longing-pain. Remember the lips where
the wind-breath originated, and let your note be clear. Don't try to end it.
BE YOUR NOTE."    -Rumi

There is a polarized expression of emotion and experience in the mind of loss and longing which becomes the basis of all human drama. This particular song doesn't bring in guilt or fear as ingredients or developments of losing love - the 'why' of it isnt referred nor any sense of unworthiness - just a black fate and a personalized sense of 'Sea' as the power and effect of separation.

There is also a healing and transcending expression of feeling-being in the waking up as unified perspective and presence.
This is a shift from identifying with a polarised part in an emotional drama to feeling the movement of love's presence now.

Although words and concepts are clumsy things and associated more with the wars in the mind of Human than communicating in love - I felt to write this much with them anyway...

The healing nature of music and dance is at least partly because of feeling the energetic of our drama and being it as embodiment in music and dance, such as to open or shift into a perspective of a shared loving presence. Such understandings are in the heart and not the head - and are facilitated rather than imposed or used as costume.

What it is to be human, and what it is to be Divine - are not so far apart. Its all a matter of perspective.

(No need to read on, if you don't relate to the subject, but I felt to write on...)

In singing and dancing Thalassa, I feel a tension of an outward longing in the verse that remains in motion unfulfilled - with the second part (where we move into the centre) - having a sense of seeking solace and connection within, that brings a temporary respite. Then in the chorus there is a wonderful release as an expression of full-feeling. (Which dances a different energetic through the same step pattern).
A true catharsis lets the movement of the heart find its expression in a context of trust - in place of the censorial mind that was set up as if to suppress and control a sense of mental and emotional chaos.

Self-Realisation, (or whatever phrase points to the same thing for you),  is at least in part the coming back to a perspective of wholeness - that cannot be defined or described and constructed or achieved within the context of the framework of thought that we could loosely call our 'separation experience' - where separate concepts manipulate separate things as if there were no unified field of awareness - in which and of which is all existence.

I confess to having a bias towards embracing the separative, as a means of remembering the unified, rather than persist in its drama.
If there is an end of the world as we know it and a renewal or shift of consciousness going on, then it will be a simple but profound shift in us all as one - whereby we wont be able to afford to maintain the structures of a conflicted self sense and will need and desire to learn and discern from a unified perspective.

When people find the mind of clever thinking is not the way to safety or abundance, but to a desolate despair, then music and dance and the true art of all things will find soil in which to grow.
It isn't that we do not in some sense know - but that the knowing of the heart is disallowed and usurped by a polarized experience in which conditioned reaction has denied any true receptivity.

The receptive is not passively acted upon - but calls and embraces with discernment!
The extension of life is not blindly projective - but is rooted and guided in the receptive.
When we get out of kilter - what I tend to call 'separation' occurs.
Then we embrace or accept what we do not truly want (or love) and yet share it as if we do, and fuel it with dreams of connection - acted out in rituals of not really joining hearts and minds in shared purpose.

Forgetting seems to me to be a condition that calls for remembering - and this world is a very distracting experience!
I feel our dance offers one tool, path or vehicle - among many - to serve the desire for renewal of perspective and purpose.
I recall crispbread adverts from long ago that qualified their slimming claims by adding 'as part of a calorie controlled diet'. I have always felt the healing and renewing power of our dance to be likewise - part of a whole way of life.

The breakdown of old patterns of human culture at all levels - along with changes in climate, makes a very compelling case for the uncovering of the basis for the renewal of culture - both in personal and universal terms.

Sharing in the passion and the presence of life.

Now of course there are those who simply want some exercise or to allay alzheimer's in a pleasant musical way - (or any other perfectly valid motivation). but if the intention of the dance is held as a core culture, then that is what will be called forth - in a way and in a manner that freely arises in relationship together.

In Peace

Brian