Connection weaves a web through time and space…
One moment bleeding into another. One breath bleeding into another. One life bleeding into another. One civilisation bleeding into another. One species bleeding into another.
(Sorry for all the blood.)
Is it all smooth and continuous, or can one thing and another, one moment and the next, be differentiated in discrete packets, in staccato quanta? Does it all just depend on how we look at it; our minds creating borders in an endlessly unfurling flow…?
Or is everything knitted together by a complex pattern of unimaginable interdependence. Pluck one string, and the whole universe sings in harmony.
Doesn’t everything just depend? The Mind makes Things out of Change…
We discern a vast time abyss, yet all of history is expressed in the present.
We connect first to disconnect; once disconnected, connection can follow. Connection is separation. Separation is connection.
We connect in movement, our disparate parts becoming sinuously one.
Repetition – developing a feeling for connection, but moderate and balanced. Too much repetition becomes mindless, robotic, and unproductive.
Optimum pace. Too fast, the connection is lost. Too slow, the same, especially if the breathing is not anchored and smooth.
Optimum tension. Too tense, the connection is lost. Too loose, the same – a disorganised mass of flesh-porridge. But with a gentle, relaxed stretch of the sinews, everything can link together and synchronise. A coiling snake. Kelp in the current. A cast line. An arcing whip.
Connection is subtle in Zhan Zhuang, in San Ti Shi. Connection is profound in meditation. A disconnect from the ordinary mind. An immersion into a greater awareness that was never missing, just unperceived.
Connection is beautiful when expressed in the movements of the dancer, the athlete, the martial artist.
Attention. The mind neither wandering nor overly focused. Concentrated, but not intense. Diffusion without total entropy, maintaining a malleable, movable awareness that shines softly on parts yet still illuminates the whole.
Connection is the senses. Connection is an exchange, through membranes, through fascia, between neurones, from channel to channel, from link to link, from outside to inside, from inside to out.
A neuroscientist: “Connection is oxytocin. It’s serotonin.”
A Chinese Medicine practitioner: “Connection is a function of Lung Qi. Of the Yang Qiao Mai.”
Connection is pollination. A hummingbird’s beak. A bee’s legs.
Connection is wind and bough. Tide and cliff. Heat and rain. Rise and fall. In and out.
Connection is ubiquitous. Connection is eternal.
Connection is the heart. Connection is support, comfort, warmth, belonging. Connection is a smile.
Connection is our DNA, our bodies, our touch, our words, our expressions, our gestures, our breath, our heartbeats. Connection is synchrony. Connection is ebb and flow. Inhale. Exhale. Each merging into the other.
Connection requires individuals. Connection requires commonality.
Connection requires practice. Process. Rhythm. Flow. Continuity. Breaks. Movement. Relaxation. Articulation. Differentiation. Wholeness. Space. Difference. Homogeny.
Connection can be explored deeper and deeper. Just when you think you are connected, another layer emerges. Deeper we dive.
Two people fight. They connect to each other. They connect to the ground. To the same earth.
We can connect with each other, with Nature, with our own bodies. We can disconnect from them, too. And, from time to time, we probably should. Aloneness is universal. But aloneness is not loneliness.
Aloneness.
All one-ness.
Connection is an inherently good and desirable thing.
… But if I connected myself to the mains supply…
And separation is, of course, always bad…
… Except with regards to eggs when making custard…
The Azure Dragon 