Awakening: The Cosmic Joke

Bliss and Drumming: The Slow Enlightenment of the Hard Rock Drummer

From the blog www.blissanddrumming.com, Clementine reads this piece: http://blissanddrumming.com/2018/06/awakening-the-cosmic-joke/. *** Music provides a great illustration of this. I am on stage, playing drums in front of an audience. My thoughts float through as I play the song: the stick in my hands, the flutter of worry about something tricky coming up, the way the other instruments are playing , the sound or lack of it coming through the monitor. I feel these things rise; I allow the twinge of worry, the irritation with the monitor, the doubt or focus. Rather than obsess or lose my place in the song, however, I fall into that open awareness, allow everything to rise and fall, while remaining fully present in the song. When I play this way, I connect with each moment, each melody, while I am still aware of my technical being, and the other ears in the room hearing the song, and where I am in it. I am fully then in the center of the moment, experiencing it all and letting the song play me. I can rest in that wider awareness while the small Clem is counting the fill and adjusting her stick and allowing emotions and thoughts to appear, and it is all of utmost importance and of no importance at the same time. Duality is something we learn to discard in this practice. It is all relevant and irrelevant, trivial and the most important song that has ever been played. The only song, for that matter.