As I get older, I realize that simplest things are the most difficult. They are also the most worthy of pursuing. Let me give you some examples.
Ho-San in Kyoto started my Sumi lessons with a simple exercise of holding the brush vertically, and drawing a single steady line from left-to-right - one breath, one stroke, one line. Then repeat this right-to-left, up-to-down, and down-to-up. Simple, huh? Yes. But also really difficult. The line had to be an unbroken vertical or horizontal, steady - not wavering, of uniform thickness and of same hue or darkness, throughout. To mind all these conditions, and to paint a simple line, one essentially required - no mind.
The practice of Dhrupad vocal requires a regular early morning practice of Kharaj - or singing a basic Sa, at the lower octave. This is about the most profound and spiritual part of my day - to sit in darkness facing a small oil lamp with my tanpura on my lap - plumbing the depths of swaras to the lowest rumble of a Kharaj - my stone Saraswati sits in that glow, pensively listening, even smiling . One deep breath in, and a Kharaj - sung on an out-breath. Again, simple? Not at all. The voice, emerging from the pit of your belly, should be stable - not wavering, prolonged over a long stretched out exhalation, at steady volume and also tuned to that perfect pitch of the tanpura. Minding all this - one becomes mindless - and just a droning sphere of sound waves.
And the final simple exercise - to sit in meditation. To sit - emptying into void - time, existence, all mind. Just sit - in attention. Simple? No, no..the most difficult. To just be - in this moment, this now. Sitting, watching, closed eyes - behind closed eyes - the chitta-akash or the mind-sky. Monkey-mind drags you away climbing this tree or that - jumping up and down or about. You realize this and return to attempt focus - by watching the waves of breath - in and out, in and out. But the act of watching makes the ocean-breath choppy, erratic. Coming from the belly, or chest, or throat? What is this incessant movement - this life - thoughts again wander. What's so difficult about sitting still and silent with closed eyes? Everything - just try it. I try it and sit with it - sometimes in laughter - that I can't manage even the simplest of things. But that's what makes them worthy of practising - the fact that they are so simple - and, yet I can't do it at all. Even though I am improving, I am also increasingly farther all the time - from this distant goal of doing simple things - just right!
Ho-San in Kyoto started my Sumi lessons with a simple exercise of holding the brush vertically, and drawing a single steady line from left-to-right - one breath, one stroke, one line. Then repeat this right-to-left, up-to-down, and down-to-up. Simple, huh? Yes. But also really difficult. The line had to be an unbroken vertical or horizontal, steady - not wavering, of uniform thickness and of same hue or darkness, throughout. To mind all these conditions, and to paint a simple line, one essentially required - no mind.
The practice of Dhrupad vocal requires a regular early morning practice of Kharaj - or singing a basic Sa, at the lower octave. This is about the most profound and spiritual part of my day - to sit in darkness facing a small oil lamp with my tanpura on my lap - plumbing the depths of swaras to the lowest rumble of a Kharaj - my stone Saraswati sits in that glow, pensively listening, even smiling . One deep breath in, and a Kharaj - sung on an out-breath. Again, simple? Not at all. The voice, emerging from the pit of your belly, should be stable - not wavering, prolonged over a long stretched out exhalation, at steady volume and also tuned to that perfect pitch of the tanpura. Minding all this - one becomes mindless - and just a droning sphere of sound waves.
And the final simple exercise - to sit in meditation. To sit - emptying into void - time, existence, all mind. Just sit - in attention. Simple? No, no..the most difficult. To just be - in this moment, this now. Sitting, watching, closed eyes - behind closed eyes - the chitta-akash or the mind-sky. Monkey-mind drags you away climbing this tree or that - jumping up and down or about. You realize this and return to attempt focus - by watching the waves of breath - in and out, in and out. But the act of watching makes the ocean-breath choppy, erratic. Coming from the belly, or chest, or throat? What is this incessant movement - this life - thoughts again wander. What's so difficult about sitting still and silent with closed eyes? Everything - just try it. I try it and sit with it - sometimes in laughter - that I can't manage even the simplest of things. But that's what makes them worthy of practising - the fact that they are so simple - and, yet I can't do it at all. Even though I am improving, I am also increasingly farther all the time - from this distant goal of doing simple things - just right!
