A 3 min. read
GAPS
Q: How is psychotherapy like music, poetry and art?
A: It is the gaps between the musical notes and poet’s words. The silence between those sounds as they reach your ears one note after the other. Split second pauses before the light from the art object hits your eye and registers in your brain. Barely perceptible transitions from one to the other when your senses seem empty.
If you are attentive you can almost hear, see and/or sense the silences and pauses before you can have a thought about them. Before you formulate an impression and a ‘like or dislike’ about them.
Some define this place of momentary emptiness and of nothing happening, as living in the ‘here and now’; a place of awareness without thought. Neutral waiting, totally accepting of whatever is to come.
Much music and art can be experienced in awareness and can support healing, balance and alignment. By alignment I mean synchronizing and resonating with your true SELF.
Or, more simply said {this is Therapy Made Easy after all}, of ~ being true to yourself ~ which is certainly a goal in psychotherapy.
I suppose this may be a continuation of my last post:
‘I Do Not Know’
It relates to my last post in that it is about allowing a spontaneous response to whatever one is experiencing, in the moment, to authentically emerge – rather than feeling an urgency or need to have a response preplanned and ready at hand.
Similarly, in therapy it is the silences and gaps that are often most interesting; most telling. The things that are not said, avoided, resisted and ignored. If I am willing and able to be in these moments, patiently waiting – rather than rushing ahead to some forgone conclusion – then I am most likely to be surprised by an aha, delighted (or disappointed) by the unexpected and, most importantly, moved deeply by the human being before me. These gaps and silences are, I believe, the heart and soul of the best therapeutic encounters.
They are the fundamental, building blocks (more like grains of sand than blocks) which are the catalysts for the most profound and lasting therapeutic growth and change.
Like grains of sand in that they are small
and
Easily missed if I am not looking out for them
When there is silencing of voice, a silencing of thinking, a willingness to not know | be empty — this is what most often allows something new, refreshing, insightful, creative, imaginative and life changing to emerge.
Pause often and give yourself lots of silence, stillness, emptiness and gaps
My inspiration for this post:The Fourth State of Consciousness http://communicate.eckharttolle.com/news/2015/08/11/noticing-the-gaps-the-fourth-state-of-consciousness/