| | imagefalling | Apr 14, 2005 1:06pm | from "Exterminator," 1973
DE is a way of *doing*. It is a way of doing everything you do. DE
simply means doing whatever you do in the *easiest* most relaxed way
you can manage which is also the quickest and most efficient way, as
you will find as you advance in DE.
You can start right now tidying up your flat, moving furniture or
books, washing dishes, making tea, sorting papers. Consider the
weight of objects exactly how much force is needed to get the object
from here to there. Consider its shape and texture and function where
exactly does it belong. Use just the amount of force necessary to get
the object from here to there. Don't fumble, jerk, grab an object.
Drop cool possessive fingers onto it like a gentle old cop making a
soft arrest. Guide the dustpan lightly to the floor as if you were
landing a plane. When you touch an object weigh it with your fingers,
feel your fingers on the object, the skin, blood, muscles, tendons of
you hand and arm. Consider these extensions of yourself as precision
instruments to perform every movement smoothly and well. Handle
objects with consideration and they will show you all their little
tricks. Don't tug or pull at a zipper. Guide the little metal teeth
smoothly along feeling the sinuous ripples of cloth and flexible
metal. Replacing the cap on a tube of toothpaste... (and this should
always be done at once. Few things are worse than and uncapped tube,
maladroitly squeezed, twisting up out of the bathroom glass drooling
paste, unless it be a tube with the cap barbarously forced on all
askew against the threads). Replacing the cap let the very tips of
your fingers protrude beyond the cap contacting the end of the tube
guiding the cap into place. Using your fingertips as a landing gear
will enable you to drop any light object silently and surely into its
place. Remember every object has its place. If you don't find that
place and put that thing there it will jump out at you and trip you
or rap you painfully across the knuckles. It will nudge you and
clutch at you and get in your way. Often such objects belong in the
wastebasket but often it's just that they are out of place. Learn to
place an object firmly and quietly in its place and do not let your
fingers move that object as they leave it there. When you put down a
cup separate your fingers cleanly from the cup. Do not let them catch
in the handle and if they do repeat the movement until fingers
separate clean. If you don't catch that nervous finger that won't let
go of that handle you may twitch hot tea across the Duchess. Never
let a poorly executed sequence pass. If you throw a match at a
wastebasket and miss, get right up and put that match in the
wastebasket. If you have time repeat the cast that failed. There is a
always a reason for missing an easy toss. Repeat the toss and you
will find it. If you rap your knuckles against a window jamb or door.
If you brush your leg against a desk or a bed, if you catch your feet
in the curled-up corner of a rug, or strike a toe against a desk or
chair go back and repeat the sequence. You will be surprised to find
how far off course you were to hit that window jamb, that door, that
chair. Get back on course and do it again. How can you pilot a
spacecraft if you can't find your way around your own apartment? Its
just like retaking a movie shot until you get it right. And you will
begin to feel yourself in a film moving with ease and speed. But
don't try for speed at first. Try for relaxed smoothness taking as
much time as you need to perform an action. If you drop an object,
break and object, spill anything, knock painfully against anything,
galvanically clutch an object, pay particular attention to the
retake. You may find out why and forestall a repeat performance. If
the object is broken sweep up the pieces and remove them from the
room at once. If the object is intact or you have a duplicate object
repeat sequence. You may experience a strange feeling as if the
objects are alive and hostile trying to twist out of your fingers,
slam noisily down on a table, jump out at you and stub your toe or
trip you. Repeat sequence until objects are brought to order.
Here is student at work. At two feet he tosses red plastic milk cap
at the orange garbage bucket. The cap sails over the bucket like a
flying saucer. He tries again. Same result. He examines the cap and
finds that one edge is crushed down. He pries the edge back into
place. Now the cap will drop obediently into the bucket. Every object
you touch is alive with your life and your will.
The student tosses cigarette box at wastebasket and it bounces out
from the cardboard cover from a metal coat hanger, which is resting
diagonally across the wastebasket and never should be there at all.
If an ashtray is emptied into that wastebasket the cardboard triangle
will split the ashes and the butts scattering both on the floor.
Student takes a box of matches from his coat pocket preparatory to
lighting cigarette from new package on table. With the matches in one
hand he makes another toss and misses of course his fingers are in
future time lighting cigarette. He retrieves package puts the matches
down and now stopping slightly legs bent hop skip over the washstand
and into the wastebasket, miracle of the Zen master who hits a target
in the dark these little miracles will occur more an more often as
you advance in DE... the ball of paper tossed over the shoulder into
the wastebasket, the blanket flipped and settled just into place that
seems to fold itself under the brown satin fingers of an old Persian
merchant. Objects move into place at your lightest touch. You slip
into it like a film moving with such ease you hardly know you are
doing it. You'd come into the kitchen expecting to find a sink full
of dirty dishes and instead every dish is put away and the kitchen
shines. The Little People have been there and done your work fingers
light and cold as spring wind through the rooms.
The student considers heavy objects. Tape recorder on the desk taking
up too much space and he doesn't use it very often. So put it under
the washstand. Weigh it with the hands. First attempt the cord and
socket leaps across the desk like a frightened snake. He bumps his
back on the washstand putting the recorder under it. Try again lift
with legs not back. He hits the lamp. He looks at that lamp. It is a
horrible disjointed object the joints tightened with cellophane tape
disconnected when not in use the cord leaps out and wraps around his
feet sometimes jerking the lamp off the desk. Remove that lamp from
the room and buy a new one. Now try again lifting shifting pivoting
dropping on the legs just so and right under the washstand.
... theres more but too long for one post |
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