Hi Friends,
This month is more of a ‘bring and share situation’. Finishing up loose ends before August (so I can take a break before starting my PhD) is taking up all the bandwidth, so I thought I’d share a few simple thoughts and things.
Some of the loose ends are joyful, including supporting a lovely dance company and taking part in a dance performance for the first time ever! Other things on the to-do list are not unenjoyable, just contraflow to the direction things want to be going in.
Flotsam and jetsum from the spaces between…
Reading Timothy Moreton’s All Art is Ecological introduced me to the idea of the Bardo, a concept from some schools of Buddhism. The Bardo is an intermediate, transitional, or liminal state between death and rebirth. This transition is not meant to be quick - we are supposed to stay there for a time to learn and notice. Bardo can be used to describe the state between two lives on earth, and in some practices there are six Bardos: the Bardo of This Life (or birth), the Bardo of Meditation, the Bardo of Dream, the Bardo of Dying, the Bardo of Dharmata (or true nature) and the Bardo of Existence (or karmic becoming).
Whist hanging out in the Bardo, the idea is to decide which bits of the past life to take onto the next, and to evaluate past behaviours. The Bardo can get dangerous if we are overcome with hallucinations which might propel us into an undesirable rebirth. It is a time of listening to what has been, what is, and what might be coming. It is where we get to set the vibe of the next life.
The Tim Moreton book was recommended to me by printmaker Molly Brown, who also put me on to Strangers by Rebecca Tamás – which explores relationship with the nonhuman. Feeling into one’s relationship with the wider world (in macrocosm and microcosm) seems like a good use of time in the Bardo, along with re-evaluating relationships and having conversations that matter.
I am also finally reading the next book in Sophie McKeand’s MTHR trilogy, and downloaded the audio version of Prophets of the Red Night to give my hayfeverish little peepers a break. Ecofeminists, sci-fi and cli-fi fans; check it out.
In unpsychology magazine’s Substack, I was struck by Kasia Witek’s article I am nature and her dance film Solastalgia (which has stayed with me).
It might be un-Buddhist to have some fun in the Bardo, but it is that unusually sociable time of year. From late May to mid-August I seem to have more social beans than usual, and some party time is in order. Our household is trying out ‘being more French’ and a little more joie de vivre in life. Being British is a bit somber at times. While we’re busy being uptight, mildly grumpy and ‘functional’, the French value long conversations, good wine, good bread and pastries. Dinner is shared with good friends and lasts a long time, and the point is that it’s not a party – more an ongoing gentle stream of conviviality. We Brits on this weird little island just go nuts at the first flash of summer, which isn’t good for frazzled little neurodivergents such as I. Joie de vivre is creative and connected; a slower version of community for quieter souls who treasure solitude but also quite like other people.
There are a few more poems and mediations available on Soundcloud now too. I recorded one of them today after a beautiful swim in a local lake yesterday. Otherwise, I have tidied my house for Summer Solstice and am now exhausted –so I will leave you with these fragments, make of them what you will.
Happy Solstice!