Your Map
You will need some kind of a padded surface, such as a Yoga mat or folded blanket. You should also have a folded towel nearby, that you can use to put under your head when lying on your side. One of the lessons is for sitting in a chair, and another can be adapted for sitting in a chair. If you want to write or draw, have your materials nearby.
Click the link for the scan.
Does your attention travel to any one area before the others? Does some area interest you more than the others? Does one part feel bigger or more aware than the others?
Set yourself about ten minutes. You have the option of
1) drawing the area which comes to your attention, in whatever way you like, or
2) writing about it.
Here are some writing suggestions. Feel free to do something different.
⇒Write the name of the part. “My neck” for instance, as many times as you like, until something occurs to you. Write as quickly as you can, not returning to edit. Don’t worry about spelling or grammar. Write as badly as you can, whatever that means for you. If you are at a loss for words, repeat “my neck, my neck, my neck.”
Need an example? Here’s a poem by bpNichol from his book Selected Organs, Parts of an Autobiography.
⇒Create a cluster. Write “my neck” in the middle of the paper, circle it, and then draw circles nearby including related words, connecting them with lines. You may create more than one cluster, branching out from the central word. You may at some point get a sense of a whole piece of writing that could emerge.
Here are some examples of clusters.
Language is a Virus is a website using randomization in combination with the works of avant-garde writers. It might offer some ideas about other ways to proceed.
After about ten minutes click one one of the dots at the top of this page and do one or more of the Awareness Through Movement lessons.
Then return, either to the first activity or choose another activity.
The associations don’t matter – positive, negative, obscene, obscure. The purpose is to disrupt habits of thinking and create new possibilities, but most of all to practice remembering that you have a choice.
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