…understanding our past(92)…

Unfathomable because we essentially know the Latin take on Celts and Druids and Bell-Beakers, which is the Continental Celtic take, and the Bell-Beaker take and from where all of science springs. And the Insular Celtic take on all of this is derided as mystical and unscientific. Let alone echoes of the Megalithic Culture’s take on this – for which we can look to Egyptian, which is always derided as even-more-mystical and even-more-unscientific: an echo of the 5,500 year old Nubian culture from which it springs and not something for an educated Westerner to be reading. Yet this is the other side of our own culture, disregarded as ‘natural’ and ’emotional’… and preserved by a minority in the villages of England 1).

  1. See for instance the works of Patricia Slade, such as https://www.amazon.com/Natural-Magic-Seasonal-Traditional-Witchcraft/dp/0600570649/

Lynn has several sculptures to cast to order…

..go to Lynn-san’s website, and read her blog….

Blue Hen Cookies!!!!

Alison-san is making the most delicious shortbread cookies: Blue Hen Cookiesavailable at Lark and Larder, the Boise Coop, FarmDeliver, Savory n’ Sweet, and Ketchum Kitchens….

…and more…

A change of optic:

Aikido is a gem of many facets – sometimes it seems that every one of O’Sensei’s students remembered a different teacher, and of course, many, many different styles have been preserved and developed – but here is one facet that clicked into focus for me recently:

what if O’Sensei spent his time away from Iwama and Tokyo coherently pursuing what he felt to be his “mission in life”?…

what if he spent his time away from Iwama and Tokyo creating and nurturing a network of dojos run by Omoto-Kyo, ex-Omoto-Kyo and Ko-Shinto believers ( hand-picked deshi,  some of them raised, almost, as members of his family) – – – and ex-Kamikaze pilots, too (!) – often with his own name on the sign –  in places – and close to shrines…

read more:

Sensei teaching…

…seekers all(12)…

— by Kimbal Anderson Sensei

Anyway – that’s what we’re going to work on.

You can work on it all the time.

If you’re going to pick that object up, if you feel, as you reach, any tension point, just go ‘heavy…’ and let the part that you have put your attention on be heavy. You don’t have it do anything else, no relaxing. Nothing. Because if it’s heavy it’ll do this. It’ll orient. And when you get that as a way… If you’re a little off-balance, instead of hurrying to get out of the bad place, you go ‘what’s tight?… Heavy…heavy…’ Now there’s no tension. Now I can…

I’m never going to lost my balance. So I can literally ….

Any place that feels tight, I just go ‘heavy…heavy…heavy…’ The more you do it and the more often, as a mundane habit you apply it, the better, so it’s just the way you adjust yourself with gravity… it’s your method of always being in alignment with the the force of gravity, always by releasing blocks… bindhu.

Because it’s a system.

…tai no henko!…

…and again!…

Aiki-no-Yugen-no-Kigaku-ho, Saturday, June 1

Understanding that the mystery of existence is directly related to the ki-connectedness between us all can allow us to learn techniques for influencing an audience, fellow-performers, or an opposing swordsman. And the experience of practising these same techniques enhances our own creative flow and powers of collaboration.

Kigaku – – – the study of ki – – – is a part of most traditional Japanese arts – – – comprising a rich body of practice and wisdom: ki-flow, kizeme, working with our ki-body…

Practising these traditional exercises in the sacred dojo space, constructed according to mikkyo principles, is in itself a powerful and revelatory experience, and a making contact with the roots of Suzuki actor training,  and of many  gendai martial arts.

Practised as a ‘do‘, a Way, kigaku is a gateway to the mysterious: monji yugen kigaku-ho –  A returning to the roots of the ancient (ken-no-michi) to deepen the modern (Suzuki-ho).

“…opened up new opportunity for continuing growth, already reflected by improved engagement in my writing these past two days.” – Heidi Kraay, playwright and theater-practitioner

For performers, artists, and creative practitioners of every tradition. 

First Saturday of the month, 9:00 – 10:30am.

* mat fee $15 *

 

 

…understanding our past(92)…

Paleolinquistics is actually super-complicated because one is continuously re-thinking the work of older scholars who made all kinds of assumptions based on the monoculture they saw all around them… despite the fact they speak Latin and Ancient Greek themselves.

In fact most people worldwide speak two or three or more languages, even today.

And archaeology suggests a distribution of cultures far different from what we expect from historic times and far more varied – centralizing, normative forces being the exception rather than the rule – and then what there were, may not have been geography-based… Consider the Bell Beakers, and their archaeology, and possibly with a historical overlap as the Celts that we know… Consider, too, the organizational forces that governed the Druids over all of Europe, as an example of how prehistory can be alien to us, and unfathomable…