Elemental Re-education

ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION allows us to re-connect with the elemental forces (FIRE, EARTH, WATER, AIR , ETHER) on this planet and how they shape and form and translate into our relationship with TIME, GRAVITY, FLOW, SPACE, VOID.

ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION is about the embrace of our physical & metaphysical existence in the earthly reality of our individual bodies as well as our collective body: the Earth planet . We are entering the inner UNIVERSE as a reflection of the outer.

The physical and metaphysical ground I stand on:

Our Body - NATURE’s ultimate piece of ART - is our holy musical instrument.

CREATIVE EXPRESSION is our birthright and responsibility. It is the least expensive, most enjoyable holistic preventative health care, and it has been tested for thousands of years.

LIFE is an uncontrollable MYSTERY, a journey into the UNKNOWN.

We carry the UNI-VERSE inside of us. We can choose to open the doors from within.

The EROTIC is at the core of our ESSENCE.

EMBODIMENT of our talk is the freedom of AUTHENTICITY of being in our NATURE. The utmost PERSONAL is the UNIVERSAL.

There is only ONE divine Source and PRESENCE. Our life-force flows from this divine fountain of our essential erotic NATURE
* as our creative-inspirational-artistic power (YANG-form)
* as our procreative-primal-sexual power (YIN-form)

ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION
states that this Divine Consciousness is manifest in body and mind. Life on this planet is conceptualized by the conscious or unconscious INTENTION of creating a baby. The life of the baby begins with BREATH.

BREATH = SOUND and MOVEMENT = MOTHER PRINCIPLE
I breathe, therefore I am !
THOUGHT, WORD, IDEA, INTENTION,IMAGINATION, DESIRE is the other creative spiritual principle = FATHER PRINCIPLE
I think and speak, therefore I am creating my reality.

I declare equality between the power of breath and the power of word inside of me. Through breath I get in touch with the universal inside of me.
Through word/idea/imagination I create my unique-individualized expression of it.
I approach the realm of the unified CONSCIOUSNESS of the HEART from above and below:
By embracing my body I free my emotions.
By embracing my mind I select my emotions: I choose LOVE.
By embracing Spirit I free my mind and body: I choose PEACE.

Past is mind-time edged into body. Future is mind-time projected out of the body. PRESENCE is body-time…it is the PORTAL into LIGHT-TIME…. into the BLUE-
PRINT of SELF.
 Stephen Nachmanovitch writes in his book: FREE PLAY ~ The Power of Improvisation in Life and the Arts - a highly inspirational guide to mystic creativity.:
“The imagination is our true self, and is in fact the living, creating God within us” (p.193)
I’d like to add:
Breath is our true self and is in fact the living, creating GODDESS within us.

 


ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION is emphasizing and honoring the entry into our physical existence here on this planet.It wants to shine light onto our first developmental phase as babies and infants. Every Newborn comes into this world as a divine=creative being, as an original creatress/creator of a unique reality.Babies and infants are involved for the first 1-2 years (in the pre-verbal phase - before they venture into language and words) in the profound spiritual practice of inhabiting and mastering their bodies: the most sophisticated, complex and evolved (over billions of years) instrument on this planet.They are on a first-time date with their ever expanding reality and body-awareness - completely naturally, in their NATURE, innocently and with no self-conscious-ness. As babies and toddlers we are all original improvisers and first-time artist. Babies and toddlers give us the gift of witnessing original SOUL energy set into motion and self-expression. They are present, awake, holy, whole and fully in their senses. Our capacity as adults to be fully in our bodies, be present in our senses - completely sensuous - , stay connected to our SOURCE , to our Spirit and Soul is decided to a major degree in the first 1-2 years of our existence. By then we have etched into our bodies and psyches our elemental, existential lessons with this planet: how to relate in time, gravity, flow/change, space and void. By then we have learned or already blocked the free flow of the first universal language that connects all of humanity and other species:
BREATH, which is SOUND and MOVEMENT.
The universal language of sound and movement is spoken by all races, ages and species. We are connected to all of CREATION through movement and sound which equals: breath of life.
BREATH is LIFE’s gift to us. Creative expression is our gift back to LIFE.
It is the direct connection to our spiritual core - our SOURCE - INSIDE: our one-of-a-kind, original, primal, authentic energy of creation. From this source connection our unique gifts of creativity will unfold and flow into the world.

ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION is choosing Free Improvisation as the
mystical path into the unknown. The creative INSIDE-OUT process is a journey into the unknown. We are surrendering to the presence and flow of the inner mystery. In that journey we are re-claiming the powers of the lost FEMININE: the elements of FLOW/ CHANGE (WATER) and INTERCONNECTEDNESS of all LIFE on this planet (EARTH); those elements that got forgotten and lost in the history of the western civilization of the last thousands of years, which has been focusing on the masculine elements of FIRE and AIR. Nachmanovitch writes in his book: Free Play:

“Our body-mind is a highly organized and structured affair, interconnected as only a natural organism can be that has evolved over hundreds of millions of years. An improviser does not operate from a formless vacuum, but from three billion years of organic evolution: all that we were is encoded somewhere in us.” (p.27)

We literally carry the Universe inside of us. Here are some quotes from Nachmanovitch’s book:
“There is in all forms of expression a unitive experience that is the essence of the creative mystery. The heart of improvisation is the free play of consciousness as it draws, writes, paints and plays the raw material emerging from the Unconscious. (p.9)…………“We are beings with a little consciousness and a lot of unconsciousness, including the personal unconscious, the collective unconscious, the billion-year history encoded in and as our bodies.” (p.174)

Improvisation…”is about spontaneous expression, and it is therefore a spiritual and psychological story rather than a story about technique of one art form or another.” (p.9)“…….Spontaneous creation comes from our deepest being and is immaculately and originally ourselves. What we have to express is already with us, is us. So the work of creativity is not a matter of making the material come, but of unblocking the obstacles to its natural flow.” (p10).
“The creative process is a spiritual path. This adventure is about us, about the deep self, the composer in all of us, about originality, meaning not that which is all new, but that which is fully and originally ourselves.” (p.13)
“ Improvisation is intuition in action.” (p.41)
“It is the mystics who bring creativity into religion.” (p.12) (highlighted by me).

Here is a selection of words that connect with free improvisation:
playfulness - inner child - freedom of the fool - curiosity - exploration - experimentation - concentration - centeredness - spiritual practice - trust - surrender - synchronicities - process not product - spontaneity - surprises -patience - LISTENING - WATCHING - SENSING - natural samadhi-states -relaxation - presence - stream of consciousness and unconsciousness -risk-taking - tolerance of chaos - reliability - timeliness - coordination - freedom - self-responsibility - flexibility - FLOW - using the power of mistakes and limits - CONNECTION - contact - respect - readiness - alertness -awareness - emptying out - Void - remembering - abandonment - inspiration-uniqueness- universality - impulse - pausing - aliveness - effortlessness - grace -ONENESS

Free Improvisation is play beyond judgment.
There is no right or wrong dance, no steps to follow, no rhythm to count, no melody to hold except your own and fully owning and enjoying it. It is not about how you look, what you accomplish, it is about fully loving yourself and your unique expression and with continuous practice widening the river of self expression, developing more movement and sound vocabulary by simply doing it over and over again with the first-time-abandon of the infant.
“This is the evolutionary value of play - play makes us flexible. By interpreting reality and begetting novelty, we keep from becoming rigid.”(p. 43)
“Play is the free spirit of exploration, doing and being for its own pure joy.”(p.43) “Play as free improvisation sharpens our capacity to deal with a changing world.”…… The focus is on process, not product.” (p.45)
“The most potent muse of all is our inner child…………….“Improvisation, as playful experiment is the recovery in each of us of the savage mind, our original child-mind.” - a regression in the service of the total SELF.(p.47)
“Full-blown artistic creativity takes place when a trained and skilled grown-up is able to tap the source of clear, unbroken play-consciousness of the small child within.” (p. 48)
“ To create we need both technique and freedom from technique.to this end we practice until our skills become unconscious.” (p.73)
“ The childlike part of us is the part that, like the Fool, simply does and says, without needing to qualify himself or strut his credentials.” (p.50)
“We have all observed the intense absorption of children in play, that wide- eyed concentration in which both the child and the world vanishes and there is only play.”(p.51)…….”Buddhists call this state of absorbed, selfless, absolute concentration sahmadhi.(p.52)

Free Improvisation is a remembering and unblocking. The continuous practice of free-style dancing and sounding allows our body-mind to release the specific constrictions and peculiarities of movement and voice that have been shaped and formed by our personal history. We each have developed a unique personal style of moving and speaking and being in our bodies and psyches. Our unique way of sitting, standing, holding ourselves up, posture, way of walking, making “contact” with others and the world has formed along with the amazing “restrictions and blockages and compensations” that our mind-body-soul unity came up with in order to stay functional. Mind-body-Soul always seeks homeostasis - balance - equilibrium: - our innate healing power...and invents the most outrageous “compensations”. With free-style dancing and sounding we are slowly and continuously unblocking and unlocking the restrictions that have been etched into our bodies, we are “fluidizing” the outrageous instrument of our bodies once again…we are emptying out, so that our instrument - our bodies - get tuned and fine tuned….emotional release as much as mental blocks and judgments are going out the vocal door and the breathing body becomes more and more liquid again. We set more of our energy free and release painfully lumped up energy.(Pain is recognized as hardened, condensed, held-in energy often to a degree of chronic patterning ).


Free Improvisation is entering the flow of the unconscious. This river is always there, always existing inside of us whether we are aware of it and tapping into it or not.
“The raw material is a kind of flow - Herakleitos’ river of time, or the great Tao, flowing through us as us. Mysteriously flowing through, unstoppable and unstartable. At its source it does not appear or disappear, does not increase or decrease, is neither tainted nor pure. We can choose to tap into it or not to tap into it; we can find ourselves unwillingly opened up to it or unwillingly cut off from it. But it is always there.” (p.32)
“ Spiritual traditions the world over are full of references to this mysterious juice: ……Ch’i, ki, kundalini, prana, mana, orende and manitu, axe, baraka, elan vitale….. The common theme is that the person is a vessel or conduit through which a transpersonal force flows…..it flows through us, yet we do not own it; it appears as a principal factor in the arts, in healing, in religion.” (p.32/33)


This juice is the JUICE of LIFE itself, our vital force, our life force. It is vibrational flow, it is our innermost music and dance.The Music of the Spheres is contained in that stream. It is the dance of our DNA, our molecular stream of consciousness that connects us to the origins of this universe and the billions of years of evolutionary consciousness. We can practice and activate this stream to the end of time and beyond and come full circle back to the beginning and spiral on and on and on…..
ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION as free improvisation is re-opening the doors towards re-claiming our artistic/ creative powers once and for all for our life’s sake.

“Not art for art’s sake but ART for LIFE’s sake. “(P.182)

Improvisation is art from the inside-out.
 ART from the INSIDE-OUT is again the forgotten FEMININE approach to art.
I am widening the concept and understanding of art by seeing ART as a YIN/YANG mandala containing:
* the male creative principle of the celebration of the extraordinary and
*the female creative principle of the celebration of the ordinary.

The fascination of western culture with the genius - the male creative principle of the celebration of the extraordinary - has left us forget that every human being is artist and creatress/creator of his/her own life. The classical artistic expressions of making music,dancing, singing, acting, writing, painting,composing/sculpting/choreographing are the natural language of our SOUL.We have given away the responsibility towards our spirit and soul, we have abandoned - the feminine creative principle of the celebration of the ordinary. In cultures like Bali this principle got preserved. The Balinese say:
“ We have no art, everything we do is art” (p19)
These 7 classical artistic expressions are aligned with our 7 main chakras(energy centers) in our body:
7. sculptor/composer/architect/film maker creating harmony/peace
6. painter/photographer creating clarity/vision
5. poet/writer creating truth/communication
4. actor/player/fool /child creating LOVE
3. singer creating beauty/freedom
2. dancer creating balance/grace
1. drummer/musician creating health/ abundance

The first three creative expressions are body- based from the ground up. By their very nature they cultivate the collective/the communal-( the feminine creative principle of the circle). The last three (chakra 5-7) are mind-imagination-mentally guided from the top down. These creative expressions by their very own nature cultivate the individual/solitary - (the masculine creative principle of the line).They meet in the 4.th chakra, the heart chakra which combines the mental with the physical expression and joins into the spiral, the biology of our DNA. The heart chakra is where the player the actor, the fool, the inner child resides.
Cosmologist Brian Swimme reminds us:
“The human form of life can be considered the child of the Earth.” …”.The great accomplishment of the human form, then, was the creation of a mature form of childhood, (highlighted by me) a form of life that upon reaching adulthood, could continue to devote itself to a lifetime of adventurous play.” (p.121)
“How will you awaken your creativity? By responding to the allurements that beckon to you, by following your passions and interests….Our life and powers come forth through our response to allurement(p.51)… By pursuing your allurements you help bind the universe together. The unity of the world rests on the pursuit of passion.” (p.48)

The artist in my definition is the unique original authentic human who is connected to her/his inner source - the Self or life-force - and finds guidance and orientation from within. The creative act is always self-realisation, self-becoming and self- evaluation and an expression of self-worth and worthiness. It is the subjective victory of the inner world versus the outside values and standards. As an artist I stand alone and stand up for my utterly unique view of the world. When I am creating, I am in deepest uni-son (one-voice) with myself and the voice of ONENESS of all of creation:
“Originality does not mean being unlike the past or unlike the present: it means being the origin, acting out of your own center.” (p.179)

“Paradoxically the more you are yourself, the more universal your message.”(p.179)

When the playful artist in each person will be honored, respected and valued again, without having to live up to the standard of the genius and being silenced that way from the start, we will have accomplished the evolutionary leap towards fulfilling our truest and deepest potential as humans. As cosmologist Brian Swimme points out:
“What is the true habitat of the human? ADVENTUROUS PLAY. A human denied this habitat of adventure and surprise and play is denied the opportunity to become truly human.”.(p.122)….”Play, fantasy, the imagination and free exploration of possibilities: these are the central powers of the human person. The decvelopment of the Earth depends on the development of the human into its destiny as the self-portrait of adventurous play.”(p.123)

We will have reclaimed and embraced the forgotten feminine principle of art which connects us back to the inner reality of the creativity of the inner child - our inner first-time artist.

ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION as free improvisation is political education on the most intimate and profound level of our beingness. By fully embracing and experiencing the existence of the creative source within and the interconnectedness of all life on this planet we will be empowered to move beyond the thousands of years of historic-power-over-male-dominator-society.
Having been born into post-war Germany, life-negating messages were deeply ingrained into my psyche. When the inherent humane connection to our soul gets severed, we get disconnected from our source and our internal ethical knowing. Our heart wisdom, which is physically present in the body organ gets poisoned and paralyzed into a death-reflex. However, ethics do not have to be taught as an outside regulatory system, it is an intrinsic life-affirming and life-respecting principle , that is the culmination of an evolutionary organic process on this planet. It is coming into play when a human being is left in connection with the existential forces, in connection with his or her own bodily source and each person’s unique rhythm, timing, flow and space and the inner mystery. Only when we get torn out of our elemental, natural rhythmical, musical connection with our SELVES can we be turned into “manipulated instruments” and soulless killing machines. This is the most elemental interference with a unique organism as complex as a human being. I see feeding by the clock, early toilet training, the forcing of adult rhythm and timing, i.e. - which generations of German parents did to their babies in most rigid and “effective” ways - as one of the deepest inner roots of fascism. Our “biology” has been interfered with, the very metabolism of our organism has been changed and manipulated, trusting the truth of our inner guiding voice has been violated and pushed deeply into the unconscious of our very being. That way we were left disconnected from our ESSENCE, our creative core.
Eventually any form of fascism won’t have a breeding ground anymore. And of course, up to date, fascism is continuously showing up in different attire. Today people won’t be deported and mass slaughtered in gas chambers anymore. The tools of anihilation have been immensely refined. Mass-consumerism, isolation, technological progress at all costs keep people from their creative connectedness within and slaughter their spirits and souls, prevent self-response-ability & self-empowerment.
To claim the artist within all of us means to participate in the deepest political, psycho-spiritual healing work that our entire planet is crying out for.

ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION suggests a musical leadership model.
My leadership model for creation/creativity in community is rooted in the concept of creating improvisational music together from the inside-out. In the circle of self-empowered “players” we take turns in the improvisational dance of
soloing: stepping into the center - taking center stage and
supporting: stepping back into the circular line where everybody sees, hears, feels, respects and honors everybody else at the same time, where every voice has its place and value and is not overpowered, thus allowing MUSIC to happen.
Allowing MUSIC to happen is not foremost a question of musical expertise & training, it is above all a question of LISTENING in and RESPECTING EACH VOICE for its immanent value. In this regard musical improvisation is of itself democratic education.It’s an act of emancipation: equal-man/woman-participation…and of course, the more I practice free improvisation, the more sophisticated the music will be - up to the level of professional Jazz musicians. However Music will happen at any level of expertise as long as we listen to each other. If we don’t listen, we are locked into our separate worlds of personal rhythm, timing , melody, sound and dissonance.We are not in full resonance with each other. The spiritual practice of playing together gets more and more refined, fine-tuned as we learn to listen, watch, feel and sense into each others energies. We learn to build trust, sensitivity and smooth transitions and recognitions of Spirit moving in its own circuitry and relevance and timing. Leading and following are starting to merge - it is not important any more who leads and who follows - our EGOs have a chance to disappear. We are creating from the rock bottom of our essence and magic happens.
here are some quotes again from Stephen Nachmanovitch’s book:
“The beauty of playing together is meeting in the ONE.” (p.94)
“Each collaborator brings to the work a different set of strengths and resistances. We provide both irritation and inspiration for each other - the grist for each other’s pearl making.” (p. 95)
“One advantage of collaboration is that it’s much easier to learn from someone else than from yourself. And inertia, which is often a major block in solitary work, hardly exists at all here: A releases B’s energy and B releases A’s energy. Information flows and multiplies easily. Learning becomes many-sided, a refreshing and vitalizing force.” ( p.96)
“It is the discipline of mutual awareness, consideration, listening, willingness to be subtle. Trusting someone else can involve gigantic risks, and leads to the even more challenging task of learning to trust yourself. Giving up some control to another person teaches us to give up some control to the unconscious.” (p. 97)
“Collective free improvisation in the performing arts, music, dance and theater invites us into a whole new kinds of human relationships and fresh harmonies, in that the structure, idiom and rules are not dictated by any authority, but created by the players. Shared art making is, in and of itself the expression of, the vehicle for and the stimulus to human relationships. The players, in and by their play build their own society. (highlighted by me!) As a direct relationship between people, unmediated by anything other than their imagination, group improvisation can be a catalyst to powerful and unique friendships. There is an intimacy that can not be reached through words or deliberation, resembling in many ways the subtle, rich and instantaneous communication between LOVERS.” (p.98/99)

MAGIC happens,” entrainment”- a trance-like state happens. Synchronicities are happening by being in synchronization of and in resonance with different rhythmic, melodious and harmonious energies, ebbing and flowing. We have the rich mystical experience of being in the flow, in connection, of breathing and pulsing, dancing and sounding together as one organism: the power of ONENESS.
In this process we are dealing with the phenomena of chaos-form-chaos: it is a process of acceptance and tolerance. Moving through chaos takes allowing to be in our very own space without rules and regulations from the outside for a while, completely being at home with our one-of-a-kind sense of rhythm, timing, space, stops and stillpoints and flow. …thus creating an emptying out: we are sweeping our inner home, we are clearing out our nervous system from pebbles, rocks and boulders that might block the free flow of the “elan vitale”, the stream of unconsciousness allowing to surface into consciousness, into visible, audible, tangible form..Tolerance of cacophony, of dissonance, of disharmony, of chaos is needed in order to allow organic structure to unfold magically from the inside-out. We ride the wave until the form dissolves once again into chaos to be reborn into the next form and on and on…. the eternal cycle of LIFE on this planet…


ELEMENTAL RE-EDUCATION creates community organically, mysteriously from the inside-out. When we pursue what we love doing, creating and sharing it with others, we naturally create community or community cre(w)ates itself. It is the grassroots movement growing from the sacred ground of our Earth Mother. Ethics in the community grow out of each individual’s commitment towards achieving and growing towards the values of:
1. health/ abundance / boundaries
2. grace / balance/equanimity
3. beauty/freedom
4. LOVE
5. truth/ honesty/ communication
6. clarity/ vision/ transparency
7. harmony / peace in their own lifes and those around them. .

Here is my TRIBAL VILLAGE MODEL from 1993.

The community is ecologically self-supportive, off the grid with sustainable ener-chi;

  • is rooted in: food-production (farming/gardening) artistic production (clothes, pottery, jewelry, musical instruments,etc.), service orientation (workshops, out-reach programs, apprenticeship programs, conferences, festivals)

 

 

  • is dedicated to FREEDOM - EQUALITY - SISTER-& BROTHERHOOD
  • expressed and lived as CARING SHARING SERVING on the material,emotional and spiritual levels,
  • will focus on and develop around basic issues that everybody has to deal with in LIFE: eating, health-caring, love-making, birthing, child-rearing, sheltering, housing, communicating/relating, aging, dying
  • is committed to simplifying, reducing, recycling, reusing, improving quality in the circular motion of LIFE
  • is moving from an orientation towards having or gaining money, fame, possessions towards being and living with each other in mutual respect,support and creativity
  • will be transcending the institutions (nuclear family, schools, courtyards, hospitals, retirement homes, banks, police, etc….)
  • will be a health center offering healthy balanced ways of living in partnership in its organizational style, in education and child-rearing, in the men-women-
  • relationships, in its ecological ways of living on and with the Earth, in its trading-business style

 

  • will be an artistic, spiritual community where our daily actions are our prayers and spiritual practices, where the unfoldment of the creative, artistic potential in each member is encouraged and fostered.

  • so there is my Utopian skeleton that will grow flesh and meat .

  • “Life’s solutions lie in the minute particulars, involving more and more people daring to create their own life and art, daring to listen to the voice within their deepest original nature, and deeper still the voice within the Earth.” ( p.183) “The ultimate source and destination of creative work lies then, in the wholeness of the psyche, which is the wholeness of the world. hence the healing properties of art.” (p. 188)

    “There is nothing that can stop the Creative.” (p. 196)

    “To begin with, you will have to embrace your creative potential. The universe has unfolded to this point. It has poured into you the creative powers necessary for its further development. The journey of the cosmos depends on those creatures and elements existing now, you among them. For the unfolding of the universe, your creativity is as essential as the creativity inherent in the fireball”(p.29) from Brian Swimme: “The Universe is a Green Dragon”. A cosmic creation story.

     

    SO BE IT AND SO IT IS…….. Heike Be ……….. June 2007