6. Ground Substance

Co-researchersA possible premise for how we are all positioned together is to see ourselves as co-researchers. A circle of researchers who may each be following different threads of a pattern depending on what interests each of us. Someone may be exploring the physicality, another the worldview, another the cosmology, another the mystery, another mythology, another the physics, the healing power, the movement, the form. Each of us has a thread and together we are weaving a tapestry of exploration.

We each collect data, our experience. We share it in conversation, through whatsapp and possible other platforms. 

We each can offer hypotheses, new questions, insights.

We each apply what we are understanding and not understanding and gather more information. 

How does positioning yourself as a co-researcher, part of a team (circle), feel compared to a student-teacher (podium-and audience)  or colleague (side by side but doing their own thing) relationship? 

Lab Guidelines or the safety talk
Welcome•Consent•Respect
    Asking permission: like going into a field to gather plants: asking, is this the time and place to gather you? Are there enough plants if I gather some? In this same spirit as we explore, asking yourself is the time and place or asking/giving yourself permission to explore.
    Offering: like watering a plant or singing, what do we offer this exploration? Generally it is our listening and shining our attention to the question that is our offering.
    Appreciation: Thank you to the Earth, the plants, the life force – thank you to the Pattern, eachother…

What is a gesture or image that reminds you of this trio: asking, offering, thanking?

Gentleness
    While many styles of exploration exist and all have powerful gifts, this work is one that follows gentleness, ease, kindness. Gentleness can be dynamic. I can roar in gentleness. 

Explore what being gentle with yourself means or feels like; you might discover more about this by asking the opposite: what does not being gentle or being hard on myself feel like? Do I know the difference?

What is a gesture of gentleness?

Stop Signs
    In any exploration our system will give us signals to stop, to be done for now. Some common non-verbal signals that your system has had enough are: a reflexive gasp for air, swallowing, mind wandering, a back of the mind idea that I want to stop, jittering. Please add more. Generally, your system will learn more by stopping than when pushing through, (gentleness :)) This is similar to the power of dispersed practice compared to long practice sessions.

What are your system’s stop signs?

Dynamic Felt-Sense of Insight/Knowing and Not knowing
    In english many words around understanding are about gripping like I have a grip on this or a handle on this, you hit the nail on the head. The reverse for not knowing: words like spacy, lost, or foggy. In this work we ask how do we detect that feeling of a grip around an idea and open to the possibility of change, of not-knowing again, or holding the information lightly?  In the dynamic of the unknown, how do we support the not-knowing with ground? 

What are some words for the continuum of knowing/understanding/unknowing? One of my favorite words in this territory is to Grok something. A scifi created word that captures a deep comprehension. 

The skill of leaving the Weight of rock in the Rock
    This is a life long exploration given to me by Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. As we explore life and Nature our stories will arise. Some of these stories may carry weight, pain, stress. How do we meet these stories and not continue to carve the patterns that we likely are wanting to update? In other words, how do we meet a story, tell a story without retraumatizing ourselves or others? This exploration of putting the weight of the story in the rock, feeling the weight, then setting it down – possibly pebble by pebble, is a powerful way to begin to explore this skill. The permeations are endless. How do I listen to a hard story and not pick up the weight? (This isn’t my story.) When do I hold on to the weight? What if the weight is a boulder, a mountain? Can I lean against it, crawl into it? To put it down I have to feel it. What is enough feeling it?

A few Fundamental Questions
    Do the Patterns of Nature matter to you or seem worthwhile to explore? If so, why? What is your hypothesis, if any, of what they offer you or others? Is there an aspect of the Patterns that interests you the most? Imagine that this thread is your research territory - you are the head of that department. If so I would you begin?

Video Link for Ground Substance Session