Sensing Space/Sensing Time
Physical Contemplations on the Experience of Space and Time
September 10,11,12
8-9:15pm Eastern via Zoom
Photo: Bruce Fertman
Sensing Space
We all possess a sense of space within, or a lack thereof. Sometimes, we feel trapped, or cramped, that we have no room to move or breathe or think. Sometimes, we feel free, that the future is open to us, that the horizon widens forever, that the sky is the limit, that life is deep and vast, like the ocean. Unwittingly, we impinge upon this omnidirectional sense of space. Some of us puff out, some of us squeeze in, hold back, thrust forward, press down, pull up. Sometimes, unmeaningly, we intrude upon the space of others. We want to live our lives with a peaceful, invigorating sense of space within us. We want to feel spatially unconfined, unfettered.
Space also exists between us and the animate and inanimate world, between us and our smartphones, our computers, our steering wheels, our soup bowls, between people toward whom we find ourselves drawn to, or repelled by.
There is space around, above us, below us, before us, behind us, beside us. Often, unbeknownst to us, we live with blinders on, zooming in on what is in front of us, living our lives running along tracks, down invisible corridors, through high hedged mazes, unable to see and sense the immensity of space around us. Space exists. A lot of it.
Sensing Time
Time feels very real to us. A second is a second, a minute a minute, an hour an hour, a day a day, a year a year, a decade a decade, and yet our subjective sense of time varies. An hour can fly by in a second, an hour can feel like an eternity, for better or worse. An entire life can fly by in a blink of the eye. Ask almost any person nearing the end of their life.
The ancient Greeks had two words for time. Chronos, (as in chronological), would be clock time. Clock time is sequential, moving horizontally through time, from A to B to C. From past, through present, into the future. Chronos is quantitative, measurable time.
Kairos, on the other hand, is closer to biological time. It moves not horizontally but vertically. It goes nowhere. It is the eternal moment, a fraction of an infinity. Think of someone striking a bell, one single note, rising at once up to the stars and down to the ocean’s floor, spreading out omnidirectionally. Kairos is non-sequential, singular. It is time standing still, not flying by.
Kairos is about knowing, moment by moment, what it is time for. Now.
“A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.”
How profoundly physical these actions are of which Solomon speaks – being born, dying, planting, reaping, killing, healing, breaking down, building up, weeping, laughing, mourning, dancing, embracing, not embracing, (like during a pandemic), speaking, not speaking, loving, hating, fighting, forgiving. The biology of time.
By reading my words, already we have begun physically contemplating our experience of space and time. If you would like to delve more deeply into these themes, consider joining me for what will feel like a three-day retreat.
Yours,
Bruce Fertman
Details:
Cost: $75 for all three classes. Fee nonrefundable. Class size very limited.
If you prefer to write a check, please make it out to New Thought Vermont (a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization) and mail it to New Thought Vermont, PO Box 185, Weston, VT 05161 EIN: 201301789
Questions: call (802) 824-3810.
About Bruce Fertman
Photo: Soomin Park
“In Bruce’s class you feel as if you are sitting by a deep, soft lake. He is the embodiment of his work. His pace and patience, his quiet confidence, allows people to unfold and open layer by layer. The superfluous falls away, leaving only life’s inner vitality effortlessly expressing itself through you. And then you know, ‘That’s who I am, that is who I could be.’”
Margarete Tueshaus – Alexander Teacher, Equestrian, Germany
Gone is the straight-lined striving, the stopping and oughting. Instead curiosity, inquisitiveness, and permission to experiment, to play, to open boxes and to climb out of them into a world of possibility – a world both soft and strong. And all this through a quiet power, a clarity of speech, and a wealth of wisdom. For me, Bruce’s work is more than exciting; it is important, both to the world and to anyone involved in any way with Alexander’s Technique.
Annie Turner – Alexander Technique Teacher, England
Having done so for 30 years, Bruce continues to teach annually in Europe, Asia, and the United States helping people to understand and experience the interconnectedness between physical and spiritual grace.
In 1982, Bruce co-founded the Alexander Alliance International, an intergenerational, multicultural community/school, now with programs in Germany, Switzerland, Austria, England, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and America.
Author of Teaching By Hand/Learning By Heart, Delving into the Work of F.M. Alexander, Bruce currently lives and works in Osaka, Japan and Coyote, New Mexico.