FINDING YOUR GROOVE
This post is inspired by the great rhythm keepers of the music of our lives. From African tribal drumming, through the ubiquitous grooves of Hal Blaine, Carol Kaye and the Wrecking Crew, to the funk groove of Tony Thompson and the beautifully intuitive timekeeping of Ringo, their grooves moved us across dancefloors, through our lives, and took up residence in our minds while we were jogging, showering, or trying to otherwise not pay attention.
As life is not static, I am interested in the notion of flow both life and meditation practice. Like finding our groove. Dropping down to the root, finding the groove and letting the feel take us.
Mindfulness / Awareness practice is a form of meditation where we are mindful of an object happening in the present while allowing a natural expansion of awareness around that. At the beginning of our training this process is clunky but with practice we begin the follow the music. An anchor that connects us to mindfulness, such as the breath, should be something present, tangible, and definite. This grounding allows us to keep time with the flow of life in order that our meditation is grounded enough for us to relax and open into awareness. While mindfulness is grounding, awareness is much freer. Although seeming opposites, rather than competing, these two can work beautifully together. This is much like a rhythm section creating the ground to free the music.
In our personal practice, we can be mindful of the breath beating out a rhythm as we become aware of the room or our body to begin with. In time, we might relax further, allowing awareness of our thoughts without becoming lost in them.
This dynamic process posits an interplay between the baseline of the raw present and the abstract movement of our creative process—breath and thinking. Thoughts are very rarely in the present and so without training they might lead us away from mindfulness. When we lose mindfulness, we lose our awareness. However, if mindfulness becomes strong enough, we can allow the mind to play. Mindfulness and awareness are two distinct operations of the mind. Should we develop our mind training to a point where these two components speak to each other and work together, our thoughts, sounds, and feelings become less a distraction and more part of the music of our present experience.
Mindfulness is not stationary. Like everything in physical reality, the present moment is dynamic. It is always moving. Mindfulness is keeping our consciousness present with this movement. When we are synchronized with this movement, we are on the threshold of a flow state.
Flow state depends on what the Buddhists call the Middle Way. The Middle Way comprises the structure through which the present can flow naturally, so that the two extremes, rather than being in conflict, actually create the space within which we can move freely. The extremes become like the banks of a river. Using our musical analogy, on one end we have the strict drumbeat of a marching band; on the other extreme we have very open free jazz, which eschews rhythm for expressive content. In our lives, this refers to the fact that structure, discipline, and the needs and demands of life do not need to be in conflict with our central creative voice. As humans, we need that central creative voice. It makes me very sad that contemporary life deemphasizes that voice for so many of us. In that case, we are just keeping time until we die.
“Marching to the beat of a different drummer” is an odd statement, because everyone moves to the beat of their own drummer. They may rely on strict rhythms taught to them by society, or they may be more creative in their approach. Yet the Middle Way suggests that we can do both: keep time and allow creative expression to exist in our lives. If our creativity forces us away from form, then we are in danger of just wandering. If we cling to form like a life raft, afraid to let go into the waves around us, we stultify our creativity. Mindfulness / Awareness practice is the training that allows us to do both—to let ourselves go into the creative movement of life while continuing to return to what is integral, tangible, and present. As with teachers, musicians, or anyone involved in creative expression, finding the framework that keeps us present is essential, both for communicating with an audience and for giving ourselves the confidence to let go into the work.
In the 1990s, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s work (especially Flow and related writings) listed obstacles to relaxing into a flow state. A few of these are:
-
Anxiety (challenge exceeds skill)
-
Boredom (skill exceeds challenge)
-
Distractions and interruptions
-
Lack of clear goals
-
Living up to, or reacting from, another’s ideals
-
Lack of immediate feedback
-
Self-consciousness / excessive self-monitoring
-
Fear of failure or evaluation
-
Overemphasis on external rewards
-
Fragmented attention
-
Lack of intrinsic motivation
-
Poor balance between challenge and skill
-
Psychological entropy (inner disorder)
-
Fatigue or depleted mental energy
-
Environmental chaos or noise
-
Lack of autonomy or sense of control
These things that keep us from finding the groove in our lives are also among the obstacles to our Mindfulness / Awareness practice.
So, finding our way through life with synchronicity and flow requires not only letting go, but training the mind to provide the container that allows us to let go productively.
Carol Kaye rhythm genius of the Wrecking Crew