Restarting

I'm restarting this blog and as a student on the course TU812 after deferring in January 2014.
I am interested to find that both concepts from the course and my points of interest have been researched, clarified and digested by the activities of the last ten months. It is reassuring to feel a sense of progress in this area of research that arose simply by me having completed the first essay and the awareness this brought being used in reflection on my ongoing practise in dance and in my day to day life. Reassuring that the gap was profitable and not a failure.

I am more explicitly interested in my own mental health and in acknowledging and understanding my limitations and challenges. I have had cause to stake my position more purposefully, deliberately and publicly in relation to choices about lifestyle, social groups, health, modes of communications, tolerance levels and belief systems in order to answer to situations that have been critical because of  the inherent flaws and contradictions that have arisen from personal 'culture' that undermines my ability to be healthy and productive. Being 'unwell' is not new, but approaching solving this as a collaborative effort is.  As such there is potentially ideas in TU812 such as communities of practice, that will now have taken on a particularly charged and decisive quality.

I am uncomfortable and uncertain about documenting this personal journey as part of my Systems Thinking learning and reflection precisely because in order to do so I will have to embrace a label of dysfunction that undermines my own and others trust as to the relevance, rationality, coherency of my propositions. It is much more conducive for your own stature and dignity to privately struggle with something and latterly present that answer or insight that arose from that struggle as with confidence and security. I feel stature and dignity are necessities after a chaotic and unstable period I am also aware I can have rushed of inspiration that leave seeming disparate thoughts hanging unconstructed or connected and although every students goes through incoherency, I am obstructed by a sense of failure and shame or seeming, in short 'mad'. This illustration of a FB users status by Pedro Fins sums up how inadvertent sometimes poetic substitions in thinking can lead to delightfully left field expressions. O.k for FB, it feels less O.K on a forum full of professional business people who can manage themselves competently.

The work that I do as a performer and improvisor enacting and revealing "real time struggle" on stage and in collaboration with other performers and audience members adds another personal charge to TU812 concepts such as uncertain situations and vulnerability with valuable embodied experiences in social situations to draw from.  Even more so  I feel I have an invested interest in analysing and practising control or awareness of the forces that create change and transformation as desirable and sustainable change is of critical importance.  I feel therefore very motivated. The word "Managing" title of the course is also compelling. What would it feel like to have the skills to manage?.

I am particularly compelled to shout " look!, look! look!" at my husband pointing at the key words list for Part Two and seeing; emotions-metaphor-embodied person-mess words that figure highly for me with both positive and negative connotations.......that I didn't think I would see featuring in a text book.

Now we are really getting to it!!!!

Is it necessary to assert I am considered to have a type of mood/personality disorder? I would consider that to be accurate but not the full picture. Maybe there is truth in data that says I experience emotion more intensely and longer than another? It seems problematic to suggest you can speak to anyones inner experience other than your own. I am nervous of falling into traps in the discourse around mental illness that bias or colour my ability to reference my experience when it is asked for assignments in ways that are useful, inclusive and accessible.


This course is really bloody interesting and sticking with it to the end with a regulated, progressive, consistent and imperfect approach is part of my new learning contract.

Time, efficiency, goals, grasshoppers.

In tackling the second unit of the course I am trying to be more systematic. A recurring problem I am finding is knowing when to stop thinking and searching and start closing or clarifying a point so that the answer in the TMA is concise and has some conclusion. I'm aware that I am not alone in this feeling but it is interesting to note that is relates back to defining a boundary in both time and concept and sticking to it.

 I am now following advise from the student help pages and starting with the TMA and working backwards. As a video interview noted, this seems somehow against the openness required in embracing new knowledge but it serves its purpose for me now. To sit down to relatively open-ended task to 'learn something' today versus sitting down to recruit information, exercises, explanations that will serve me in answering the TMA is more motivating. I need something to grasp onto in uncertainty.
We need something to grasp onto in uncertainty.
In reading a fascinating article about DNA and grasshoppers and locusts I was reminded that sometimes the simple explanation wins out as its is the simple option.
http://aeon.co/magazine/nature-and-cosmos/why-its-time-to-lay-the-selfish-gene-to-rest/ retrieved 9th Dec
Yes I should use Harvard references...its so complex its and obstacle to my progress.
The article stunned me by saying locusts and grasshoppers are not part of the same species they are the same animal that undergoes rapid adaptation in times of food scarcity and in which the DNA manual for life as one of the other has not changed but 'gets read differently'. It goes on to be more complex than this and honestly eight paragraphs later I was quite lost. By my intution says to me, 'yes, this, this is truth because its relatable, complex, poetic'.( I would need much longer to explain the validity of that sentence.) Basically complexity is unpopular as it can inhibit progress and progress is a primary buzzword in the lexicon of modern civilisation.

I am also finding it difficult to identify a system of interest in my work. I noticed reading about the sticky tape drama in the Study Guide that it was manageable. I can relate the that at work. However I felt do I really want to direct a unit of this valuable OU study to a manageable task on a scale with organising a stationary order when there could be world peace to solve. Whilst I openly acknowledge not only can not one person solve world peace, its won't be me as my systemic practice is still so vague and as issues goes I'm not best placed to understand. What is important is when do we feel that alignment that the scale of problems is worth taking on, that we have the power to influence it and that we are motivated to explore it and take action.

A further issue to finding a system of interest is that I conceptualise systems interventions as involving people and find it hard to imagine a system investigation into my technical practice for example.
In thinking about applying the idea of efficiency, and often what we are aiming for in business is efficiency, I find myself in that cold hard goal orientated territory that I tried to avoid by working in the arts. I remember feeling a point was being missed in Parkour being all about efficient movement. I am fine with efficiency when it about being more elegant ( I by that I mean elegant in design and organisation rather than aesthetically pretty) but I'm a bit allergic to it in relation to progress and shortening time.

As a person I am always in a rush and 'out of time'. I am taken out of the moment by the desire to make the most of the moment. I don't like rhetoric about making the most, or milking something. Ethically its seems greedy. Yet I think in this paradigm every day and I lose touch with life. When I slow down life is better

How long does a movement take? Forsythe asked?
How can we create systems that function well, in the way ecosystems function elegantly?
How can we serve a true expression of the nature of each entity?

This is a question for me for choreography. How can we choreograph to reflect life and not put a series of themed activities together in the way cheap design programmes create a 'colourway' and paint a room a series of hues with 'accent' cushions. EUURGH.Formulaic.

When I relate to choreographic processes I recall endlessly the rehearsal days when we may have started with a plan but that a divergence is made at some point when something fresh, interesting or useful arises regardless of when the show needs to be made by. The idea of saying thats your lot, stick the choreography in where it belongs and work on the next bit is unthinkable. It also suggests that there is a system of choreography and whilst there may be methods choreography does not seem to be able to be intervened with or altered in the way you could seem to with an organisation productivity or an institutions meeting procedure ( my current area of interest).

My feeling is that it would be a very interesting more philosophical line of inquiry to use making dance work a systems of interest.

My final thought from recent days was; in organising oneself, in study, in life, productively yet responsively and mindfully am I defining a system of interest by my awareness or by my goals?.
For example I have chosen to work the TMA backward this time and study with a goal. This can seem 'unethical' or limiting. By I choose this because I am aware, I accept and make a choice to define my system of interest in studying as looking for the answers rather than racing through the open pursuit or knowledge section questioning will I run out of time to do the directed part?. As I will be organised by this either directly or discretely either way. The former way it was organising me was via a fear that you shouldn't let it organise you!
 and the second is accepting that it does and being in reality.

Final point, in scanning the book I noticed a section on emotion. Feel good I was already thinking about that without prompting during the last post and it may be encorporated. (corp, body another physical root/route).

.....and do you have to be systematic to be systemic?

Emotions

I never said it would be concise waiver.

Here are some ideas occurring to me recently as the approach gets welcomed into the approaches I already have. The point of this is to catch some lose threads of thought and also "keep knitting" as Jo says these strands together.
 Firstly I cannot stop using the word system or understanding, finding examples in terms of the idea I have so far of systems boundary defined by an area of interest etc.
Even more so my notion and relationship with change has altered greatly. I have learn that I would like to be the one to orchestrate the change, if change comes from another source and I means shift more than more organic changes, that to me are transformations, then I want to get behind the idea, or (get infront of the idea?) and lead teh change to serve my own ends. For example I heard during the first week of the course that we (theoneandonly and I) that we need to find somewhere else to live as our flat is being put up for sale. Change. Instead of being buffeted down that river ended up who knows where I have said o.k this is an opporutnity and we will use family help and buy while the many windows of opportunity are all open. So I start to make the decision that interest me and I claim the I'm moving/I'm buying system to fulfill a transformative function on me. I NEED to get something out of this and not feel a victim of casual disinterested fate, so I engineer some aims and they move swiftly from low to high priority until now I am infinitely absorbed in the endless paperwork and frustration of the 'buying a house' system which is so deeply flawed and imperfect I wonder why it hasn't been reformed. ( All I want to do know also is reform everything, which is not so different to last year but now I use the word system or systemic failure in the rant).

Why so personal is my question to myself. I'm always talking about myself, how I feel my work, I am organised my journey in life. I was listened to 3 female nobel prize winning scientist and it was so refershing to here about the work and with only a swift mention of them as in the work, as women with personalities, emotions, life stories. It seemed like they just got the job done and did so very well.

I however am really profoundly interested in emotion, what purpose does it serve, how it informs or provides a way to steer through change. In looking at the study guide for section 2 the idea of being in the unknown is raised. In dance with the students we talk about this ALL THE TIME. Don't try and be comfortable, don't expect it to make sense, keep pursuing your line of inquiry with curiosity, fin dyour motivation, find you confidence in the face of unknowns and so on and so on. I have been very concerned of late that what is I can't do what I say?. Over the summer I started performing in a piece that wasn't allowed to be set, or settle in its form and everytime we repeated a movement, a line of text any accidents or additions or debris that came in the redoing became conciously and added and the better we as dancers got at remember, organising, 5 ,6,7 bits of information and producing it attentively, responsively the more safe we felt, the less intersting things happens so the goalpost got moved again. I am beyond pleased to say that I managed to refuse the life rafts the choreographer offered in times of compassion and the purpose was to be drowning, but not die and enjoy it. It was beyond exhilarating, the question Jo posed 'is it now?' I ask over and over and is applied to everything.

So emotion (that someone pointed out to me one day is e-motion) is our shifting sense of self and shifting state of mind, emotion is change and chemically it is transformation. I don't think we can reasonably assess or reflect upon our involvement within a system of inquiry without talking about this as a driver. But not just a driver, the thing leading you and organising you but the thing teaching you. Far from being an irrational interruption to an otherwise objective and rational inquiry, it is the means by which we can learn to taste freedom, to operate as a free agent within a system.To fulfill or adapt to a potential position as agent, 'to do what is necessary',' to have what it takes' 'to respond to the situation' I'm convinced of this. We feel emotions as terrains that provide an "inner landscape" (Laban) with which we must negotiate not ignore. And there is something about our perception of inner and outer space that are reflexive, space in the body, space in the mind. Bjorn Erick said we cannot change space only our perception of it ( not sure how much I agree)

So in conclusion, emotions are a system of interest, they are the invisible forces that encourage us to defer or be passive rather than opposition and thus reaction by force not proactive by design. Alternatively when and as is currently so topically- Nelson Mandela springs to mind- when we are organised by hope, love, charity we free the potential in others and we are active agents in our wolrd, fully particpanting and responding to reality. This state o fleading is so unknown, it is to be a pioneer of you own life and it is deeply uncomfortable and this aversion to originating change, is also an aversion to particpating in change and then I arrive at the saying ' if you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem' and it leasds me to rethink perpetuity and the ethics of our obligation to feel, to acknowledge, to act and to transform

I also understand sitting on the sofa with a cup of tea and a kitkat -so often the human condition-and them I am reminded in who makes kit kat and what I am reinforcing and Iwonder is to answer the call of these difficult times a pledge to live in unending discomfort with a savage alertness to systemic failure and suffering, not as an end in itself but as a means to invite new transformed behaviour. Is the problem that the solution is too demanding, and we are not equipped to deal with an ego that needs to preserved its own self interest to do its job.

Drawing diagrams

Drawing the diagrams has been very illuminating and facilitated the thinking process (of course) (Connection; Out of Our Heads by Alva Noe)

In working through the trajectory diagram I realised the resistance in me to put pen to paper. On discussion with theoneandonly he clarified in my resistant babbling, "so it doesn't say what you want it to"?. Exactly. However in the by the 4th iteration I had clarified the groupings from 'what brought you here' as in both intrinstic and circumstantial occurences, to the ideas that brought me to the module and then to groupings organised around facets of myself as both the work and the worker in my career. The idea of scale was interesting; should it be bigger if the force of its pull is bigger e.g to be an artist or bigger if it represents a bigger the number of people in the network of involvement e.g the whole world, to collaborating, to teaching possibly. Or in terms of financial remuneration? (hahahha teeny bubbles:.))

All in all I grasped the idea of taking a position and a perspective via the diagrams in order to process and move forward. it doesn't mean you don't have multiple points of view but trying to occupy all simultaneously is overwhelming.

I tried to heed the advice "don't try and include everything'!. I reneged however in my "The Whole World' bubble in order to represent my standpoint when at my most passionate. The idea of connecting on a level of global level and also the influence of 'out there, in reality, in the furthest reaches of consciousness, in life at its most potent, complex and diverse, in a way that includes and embraces all things as informing and containing essential knowledge' is encompassed by the term "The Whole World'

Need to learn how to work the programme that draws diagrams so that I do not have to resort to prit-stick again, for shame ....I get the impression lo-fi is not as cool in S.T as it is in the artworld.

TERRIBLE SPELLING, GRAMMAR AND READABILITY

This is public notebook to keep track. I apologise for the lack of proof reading but it is not a good use of time at this stage.

Walking as a relational dynamic (ACTIVITY RESPONSE)

Friday 15th Nov
First I thought about my answer without moving which I know is not the point of the activity but I as being lazy as I had settled into reading from the workbook. I imagined walking consciously across my living room. I recalled experiences of mindful walking from dance improvisation and from kinhin as resident at Zen Mountain Monastery by paying attention I would feel the weight transfer sequentially through heel to toe, if very slow the moment of falling in between foot to foot that becomes challenging to your balance and the proprioception in your feet and ankles. I would feel the push of the floor and supporting that the push of the earth back up to support me. I imagined the contents and layout of the living room wrapping in a curve into my periphery, I imagined a short route and probably a straight diagonal line as my preference is often for that trajectory when asking to walk spatial pathways. I remember when you move the mind reminds..'are you breathing?'

When I actually did it it was much different.
My hip is in spasm so my consciousness of my adapting walking pattern is sharpened by shooting pains up the hip socket and in my adductor. I picked a very short route and noticed the rhyming of walking becomes more dynamic and syncopated when you walk asymmetrically. I noticed the surfaces under my feet change from rug to bare floor to rug. I used the back of a chair to try and circumvent the frustration of a inefficient lurching walk but it had limited success. The whole body feels askew and ill at ease. I notice my posture and lengthen the crown of my head upwards to find lightness against a condemnatory mind state. (This moment is lesser, limited, not full potential, undesirable). I feel the curving of tense fingers cool air subtly slipping between each digit. I notice I don't look down as my pathway is clear and I know it in this situation, I notice I am looking forward but not really seeing as I am reaching internally for information to record this experience for homework. When i get the six feet to the nearest wall, I lean the front of my body and the side of my face into the wall to meet the boundary, to keep the body talking, for a bit of relief and stony comfort and its feels novel and then I stop.

I am very interested to find the term 'relational thinking' used in the study guide as opposed to linear thinking. I enjoy the differentiation. I think I am a relation thinker and reflect on the authors comment about suprise about how many don't reference the surface they are walking on. It gives rise to many memories for me, the day one tutor intuitvely coaching me on a rather stiff and anxious presentation of a movement phrase that I wanted to get right, that was supposed to be generous spatially and into the full reaches of the kinesphere. I am a tall long legged person so the far reaches of my kinesphere cover alot of space if I explore them. Janet Kaylo, the teacher said to me something like ' you do know the floor is holding up right?....and there will always be a surface underneath supporting you, so you don't have to hold your own weight all by yourself. This reassurance changed my conciousness, my level of tension and control, my ability to breath and release and therefore experience weight and therefore shift with momentum all beneficial in a way that has only deepened since that first 'a-ha' moment. It also make me think of the module on the absent body, that many people relate only to the body when it speaks to them through pain. I am not suprised that many people don't mention the floor or ground. This is not the predominant culture or source of attention in Western culture, even many discourses about engaging with exercise do so in the relation of imposing control and regulation on a undisciplined body (Foucault). This reminded me of another motivation to study systems. If the relational thinking is valued and is cultivated by body experience then there is counter argument to using tech to replace physical processes.

I also was reminded of a day doing rail balancing for hours when I was Parkour training. The focussing of attention that caution or even fear gave me gave rise to me thinking something along the lines of ..'
as I walk the rail makes an impression into the surface of my feet, I have a tactile picture via touch of the 3-D proportions of the rail, reading the rail like sonar measuring depth. When my feet are tense, my balance is worse as the sensitivity and the dialogue between me and rail is lessened. The richness of info about the rail reflects the openess in my body. So the rail tells me about me, as a mirror reflect you back to you'. To which I concluded in my musing-I need to connect to environment to experience self.

Why call it head, shoulders, knees and toes (knees and toes)?

Why head, shoulders, knees and toes (knees and toes)?

This is well known song to adults and its gets learn as a child.  I have done projects with under primary age children and I have used it knowing it will be familiar. From a dance perspective you name body parts and from that you can lead into initiating from those parts into a more creative tasks, it prefaces a basic body knowledge. At school you name body parts, in the early days of foreign language you learn the noun for 'hand' or 'head' in case you need to tell a doctor what hurts. Most young children I imagine would also understand they have skin, a brain, a skeleton maybe......

Unless you independently seek out physiological knowledge you may not progress very far from this conceptual of body and one that is crucially about units rather than systems. This summer at Impulztanz Festival, Vienna, I was studying a module on Myofascial Reflex; The Psoas Connection with Kirsten Kussmaul. It is the most in depth I have progressed to far in my physiological knowledge in connection with exploratory bodywork or  'experiential anatomy'.   The first tangible step to arriving there in Vienna started 13 or so years ago. Pain is an amazing teacher and having my first full time training dance injury explained systemically to me by my physiotherapist (Paul O'Hara= amazing) made me realise with excitement and renewed respect the complexity and intelligence of the body. Furthermore, the proximity of these systems as the reality of the environment of the body revealed itself further when one day I was confused as to why lower back pain, period pain and digestive trouble were appearing at times in isolation, as clusters or a pair that progressed to all three, I was reminded that all these three areas of the body rest next to, inside or around each other. There is problem in the neighbourhood. It seems to obvious but in actuality it was a paradigm shift from seperateness to connectivity.

It occurred to me at Impulztanz that perhaps our conceptual of our physical self would be very different if we sang a different song at school. That perhaps this amazing body of knowledge would be sought out more hungrily if it had not been limited by the idea of perfunctory units. I have tried (and failed:.)) to conceive of a catchy song involving circulatory, skeletal or limbic systems, or indicate the organs or fascia as no less key players by virtue of their lack of visibility. That one end of the body is intimately and directly connected to the opposite is a paradigm shift that is enabling and humbling.

For me this paradigm shift that uses the body as a source of wisdom and knowledge, that uses the body as a metaphor for bigger ecologies and that acknowledges connectivity and interdependance creates a world that moves away from I think therefore I am, I think therefore I am better, I shop therefore I am and I shop therefore I am better than you to a sustainable community in good health.