Old English housewife saying: “Something or Nothing”. How many ways can we interpret this? Could we delve a little deeper and apply this to human life and living. In order to live we must breathe, without breath we would die. We breathe every day unconsciously. When we go into deep day dreams, mediative states or runners high we become one with the universe. Osho also talked about “No-thing” but he also referred to it as “No mind”.
The two essential qualities to the universe are:
- Empitness or “no-thing” and
- Fullness or “some-thing”.
This is my Chek Totem pole which shows the breath of life at the top and the slave joints which are the structures at the bottom. The hierachy of the totem pole is :
- Respiration and breathing
- Mastication and eating
- Hearing/balance
- Upper cervicle action
- Organs
- Emotions
- Sacrum
- Slave joints
Deeper meanings
Quantam physics now backs up the theory and tells us that “no-thing” will eventually become “some-thing”. This is the basis of human life, psychology and physiology(mind). So if we think of this from a breathing perspective the inhalation is “no- thing” entering the space of the body, the exhalation becomes “some-thing “ departing form the body. We could also think of the Bermuda triangle and the blackhole with this. There is something in the nothing if you know what i mean.
So lets think about space in the universe and space in our body. The first embodiment before we form structure is empty space. Embryolgical development from empty space, something coming from nothing. We are sequence of spaces and inhabit our spaces with form and structure. “We have to establish our support system before we can go to the next stage, a process which goes on our whole life”. Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen
Our emotional and mental states effect our spaces. When we are low, depressed or feeling blue, our physical body space can reduce with movement as we return to our safety position of the foetus. When we have adequate feeling to live we fill our spaces with breath and life .
When we move and express ourselves we initiate from the brain to the limbs but there is not always a sense of space and spaciousness. We can become more aware of this by doing right brain- parasympathetic mediative practices such as Osho meditations, Sufi dancing, Body-mind centering (Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen work), improvisation and so on. We find the point of lightness, ease and a place of space, with no stop or start a continuous cycle of “some-thing” to“no thing”.
When we practice a more linear/heavy movement pattern we have a tendency to come from left brain- sympathetic. For many cases this can be compressive, heavy, rigid and ending. So instead of thinking about the structure and structures in the body think about the different spaces, right from the bones to the teeth cavities.
“You can be unique only when you are nothing. If you are something, you are comparable.
If you are somebody you can be compared with others, and that which can be compared cannot be unique. Unique means incomparable. Unique means you are alone, there is nobody like you. So if you are somebody … If you are a man there are millions of men; you are comparable. If you are rich, then there are millions of rich people; you are comparable. If you are good you are comparable. If you are bad you are comparable. If you are a painter you are comparable. If you are a singer you are comparable. If you are somebody you are comparable, and by being comparable you cease to be unique.
The moment you attain to a nothingness, when the “I” disappears … The “I” is comparable; the “no-I” is incomparable. That’s why I say if you become nothing you become unique. If you become nothing you become incorruptible; the nothing cannot be corrupted.” Osho
Bibliography
Osho library
Paul Chek blogs
‘Sensing, feeling & action”- Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen
