PPM17 is a 'threshold meditation' because it was originally written on February 29, 2004, 'leap day,' or perhaps Leap Day! (I hadn't thought of that play on 'leap' until the writing of this summary after recording the meditation). So today, March 1, I will have to record two meditations in order to 'catch up'. The need to stay on schedule is, in fact, one of the themes of today's meditation. In PPM17, the new piece that is introduced to the experiment is Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching, and I cite a section from this seminal text that is close the material I have been musing on with respect to the question, How is it with the Nothing? Lao Tzu writes: "The (state of) vacancy should be brought to the utmost degree, and that of stillness guarded with unwearying vigor." In turn, I talk in my commentary about the vitality of the modality of learning, which may appear at times as 'docile' because it arises through receptivity, or 'passivity.' But this is not the case at all. On the contrary, receiving the tiding of the thoughtful word, and hearing evocative speech, demands strength and vigor, not to mention discipline. There is, of course, a kind of synergy that arises from a reciprocity, which is another way of saying that the excess of Being's presencing is an offering that is generative, and invigorates us, so that there is not a 'loss' of power in the exercise of strength to remain steadfast, but, on the contrary, a gaining of power, or empowerment! Much like the strength earned from the vigorous exercise at the gym.
February 13, 2014 was the 10th anniversary of the original experiment that produced 363 phenomenological mediations, published as 'Being and Learning' (Brill: 2012). Each day between Feb 2014-15, I returned to the original meditations, and my commentary is documented here. And then, again, on February 15, 2024, on the 20th anniversary of the first days of the original experiment, I revisit and comment on a daily basis, once again.
3.0 (20/10 yrs later) - 2/29/24 - Today I start dating my daily reflections on my reflections on my original mediations because today is a leap year, which I hadn't anticipated. 2004, 08, 12, 16, 20, 24. So there is some important symmetry between 1.0 & 3.0. Perhaps a minor coincidence or happenstance, but there is certainly some momentum moving me, which is not unlike the original momentum, although I am returning to this project with no pressure. The original project was pressured packed, but in the best sense, in the way that intense pressure produces gemstones, which is not to say these daily meditations are "gems," although at moments they do appear to sparkle, at least to me. On this day 20 years ago I introduced Lao Tzu, who would become a principal guide throughout the project. I don't recall how he arrived on the scene, but most like I was teaching Lao Tzu in my grad multicultural education class, which during that time was a world philosophies course. However it could be that I returned to and finally was studying the copy of the Tao Te Ching that I bought in Hoboken the day after I defended my dissertation. Again, I remember buying that copy, but have no recollection why I was in Hoboken, but presume that I was returning to Manhattan via the old route. At any rate, the line I engaged 20 years ago today: "The (state of) vacancy should be brought to the utmost degree, and that of stillness guarded with unwearying vigor." Here, the clearing, which I am currently exploring at the (w)hole through which music re-places the intentional subject and forms or situates the resonant subject, the place of listening. "Stillness" here might be the silence, the vigorous silence, full of energy and strength, which welcomes music. Might this be the affirmation, the silent saying of "YES!"? Lao Tzu says this state of emptiness -- vacancy -- "should be brought to utmost degree." I'm curious about the "should" and the "be brought". I'm curious because I'm cautious and hesitate to write in an explicitly normative way, to identify what "should be" done. But this may not be "normative" in the sense of "ethics," which is, anyway a Western construct. On the contrary, the "should be" is always linked to the "brought", which implies action. This is the action of "in-action" or the "willing of non-willing." It is a preparatory or anticipatory action, a waiting for the arrival of the evocative, of music's arrival. Yesterday Georgia, my student who am I advising on an honors thesis in the music department, had our weekly meeting, and we explored the event of listening to a live performance of music; an event because it is singular, thus rare, significant and has duration, the experience is lasting, memorable. Once this event happens for the first time -- here we almost always refer back to Du Bois' John Jones' experience with Wagner -- we anticipate its occurring again, and this is why we can talk of anticipating or waiting for music's arrival. What "should be done to the utmost degree" is the bringing about of the "vacancy" with vigor, which is to say, when the anticipatory silence is brought we are positioned with strength to receive music.
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