Hello Everyone
Guest Blogger- Simcha Frischling
Hello everyone. Thank you, Yannai, for offering me the opportunity to share on your space. I’ve never done this before so for me it’s like taking a car out for a bit of a test drive. We’ll see how it goes.
I’m one of the world’s slowest typists and I am also very busy in my life; wife, kids, making a living, some learning, (not a lot of shul time, to say the least), running an organization, etc. So I won’t be able to devote much time to writing for this blog specifically. However I am in the midst of communicating some ideas to a group of people and have decided to share this flow with you, editing it a bit as we go, so that it is more relevant for you all.
To give you some context first.
I lead a fairly young organization called Call of the Shofar. We run a 3 day experiential workshop for both men and women, in which we explore our personal evolutionary development through the eyes of the Torah and the Jewish holidays. The end goal being, awareness and growth in our wellbeing as individuals as well as the relationships we exist within. Also, we offer weekly follow-up groups in order to practice and truly integrate the teachings from our workshop.
The following correspondences will be to one of our follow-up groups in America; 25 men who meet weekly in Baltimore, all of whom have already done the experiential workshop. It is an attempt to define the nature and intention of this group in particular and probably all of the follow-up groups in general.
This might sound specific and not relevant to people not in the group, however I think it will be relevant and I will modify what I post on the blog so it is not overly specific. In any case, we’re exploring the principles of growth and evolution for individuals and community, and our group is a microcosm for those relationships.
So without further a due here’s what I basically wrote to the boys of Monday:
I recently heard someone speak about the difference between therapy, art and spirituality. He was actually using the term yoga to describe art but that does not really matter right now.
One of the metaphors he used was “I” as a stained glass window.
If the window has some broken panes and I want to fix them; that is therapy.
If the window is not broken but is dusty so that light is not flowing through; to wipe off the dust and allow the light to flow, is art.
Spirituality is the experience of being the light and the glass, simply being nothing other than the One.
Another metaphor to help make this distinction is playing music.
In terms of therapy, if I have difficulty playing certain notes or am afraid to play in public, I might very well need to do some “therapy” in order to develop more musical skills or get over certain fears.
In terms of art, I have practiced the scales, I might not be great at it, but I am going to get up and improvise in the moment. Being a jazz musician is a good example of this. I am not talking about simply playing written music or coloring in the lines. I am talking about being creative and allowing the flow of “light” to come through me in this moment. This spontaneous relationship in the moment with me conducting the flow of a medium through me I am calling art.
To be in the flow of creating art is not the same as stopping to open up kinks in the conduit. Stopping to open up those kinks would be therapy. Art often flourishes during extremes and dissonance and tension. Therapy often works during safety and calm.
What I am referring to as spirituality would be; not a fixing and not a flow through time but a simple awareness of already being that which is. An I am-ness. This third category I will not focus on much more, right now. Truthfully, I have touched this place but I don’t have a lot of experience dwelling there. As a teacher of mine once pointed out; to experience unity consciousness is grace, and we can be more available to grace through practice.
Getting up and doing therapy will allow me to be a better musician, craftsman and man, in order to access the art. And in that way therapy and art are related. However, it is my experience that great artists need to be facile with their craft, but some of the greatest artist, were certainly not the greatest craftsmen.
For instance with myself, I am an excellent woodworker in terms of my craft and am not an artist at all when it comes to woodworking. There is basically nothing creative flowing through me in that field. I am a good craftsman, period.
However when I facilitate a man’s process through the workshop or group, I am listening and improvising with the flow of notes (Midot) of the individual I am working with. In that sense I consider this work my art. Art is simply a distinction of a way of being; there are good artists and bad artists, just like there are good craftsmen and bad craftsmen. Also, like I said, a person could be a fair craftsman and a great artist and a great craftsman and a lousy artist. In terms of my art of facilitation, I could be a good artist and probably as messed up as the rest of us.
These distinctions are helpful for me to be able to distinguish what is going on in our group and what it is I would like to have happen in our group. I want to form a group that is not so different from a group of men coming together to create music. I want to distinguish the modality of our art form; Midot of being, as opposed to notes of music or colors of paint or words of stories, etc. I want to really play “music” together. I it also my intention to have men spin off and form their own groups based on their own personalities and styles.
I grew up going to jazz clubs and listened to the groups improvise around basic melodies, led by different guys. And I watched how guys in the groups would eventually form their own groups playing their own music using the same basic notes and the same basic instruments.
This is the model that I have in my mind right now and where I want Shofar Follow-Up Groups to go. Maybe we’ll call them FUGs. Does everyone have to be on board with this? I suppose not. There are creative, improvisational musicians and there are guys that are good craftsmen. In any case, everyone should be able to distinguish the notes (Midot) and learn how to play them with the instrument of themselves, even if they choose not to learn to improvise (jam) in a group with other men.
So what does this look like? Hopefully, more on that tomorrow.
Best wishes,
Simcha Frischling
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