Lockdown diary 16 : Reflections

"Music is the space between two notes" - Claude Debussy

This quote of Charles Debussy has been mentioned in the book, ‘Tao of Pooh’ by Benjamin Hoff.

How many of us have experienced this space between two notes? How many of us have experienced the gap between two things - however minuscule it may be? According to the Tao of Pooh, ‘This emptiness between two things cleans out the messy mind and charges the batteries of spiritual energy’. However so far, I haven't let myself experience this emptiness which I usually call ‘Boredom’.

Somewhere deep down I know that I have been conditioned to keep myself busy or occupied all the time. I have never experienced this nothingness or rather, I have replaced this ‘nothingness’ with something all the time. And hence I don’t really know how it would impact me. So far, I have felt uncomfortable when I spoke about ‘me doing nothing’. How can I be doing nothing? But what is this nothing?

Here is what Pooh concludes as ‘nothing’ from an excerpt from the chapter - ‘Nowhere and Nothing’

(Christopher and Pooh are out for a walk)

"I like that too," said Christopher Robin, "but what I like doing best is Nothing."

"How do you do Nothing?" asked Pooh, after he had wondered for a long time.

"Well, it's when people call out at you just as you're going off to do it,

"What are you going to do, Christopher Robin", and you say,

Oh, nothing, and then you go and do it."

"Oh, I see," said Pooh.

"This is a nothing sort of thing that we're doing now."

"Oh, I see," said Pooh again.

"It means just going along, listening to all the things you can't hear, and not bothering."

We always want to be busy - if we do have some time, we fill up our mind with thoughts and ideas. We cook up plans for our future or reminisce about our past. But rarely do we listen to the sounds of our present. Rarely do we use our senses to soak in our present.

Even when the opportunity to be is presented right before us - we do not take it. It is said that we are afraid of emptiness. Have we ever tried to keep this fear aside? This lockdown is a good opportunity for us to experience this nothingness - to experience it without being afraid... by believing that emptiness will actually take us away from loneliness. We might be alone, but we won’t be lonely. Once our mind is devoid of any kind of clutter and is completely clear, we will experience its power.

As I write about this, I realise that I want to experience this power of a clear mind. I want to experience the fullness of nothing. I want to venture into this unknown. The question I ask therefore is - do I give myself the permission of experiencing this power? Am I willing to take the effort to keep all the clutter away and clean my mind and experience how clarity helps me?
I am - are you?

Originally posted on Facebook on April 10, 2020