Extended Circle Project completed

29th December 2008
Tychy, Poland

06.00 - Rise after three hours sleep. But actually I feel better than on any other day here. Walk to meet with M.

07.00 - AAD Sitting for SW.

Hourly snapshots:

08.00 - having coffee at M's place.
09.00 - at the dentist's waitingroom.
10.00 - sitting on the dentist's chair.
11.00 - standing at the cash machine.
12.00 - walking to do one errand.
13.00 - walking back from the shop.
14.00 - -------- (where was I ?)
15.00 - sitting at the table with friend Agnieszka and my parents.
16.00 - in the anteroom, getting ready to go out.
17.00 - reading recent ECP reports
18.00 - walking for the guitar meeting.

On each hour I give attention to the feet and contact with the floor.

At 18.30 meet with Marcin at his place, preparing the space... The ECP meeting formally begins at 19 o'clock, but in fact it has already begun, the process is already in motion. We gather together at 18.55

EXTENDED CIRCLE MEETING:

There are 15 participants with Marcin as a guest.

We take time to enter the ECP space. Relax the body, let go on the out breath. Give attention to the feet and the contact with the floor and accept the support it offers. We acknowledge the Extended Circle , those who are participating tonight, and those who are not, but are part of the project. Jacek speak out their names and locations. We visualize the group as a whole, working together despite the distance limitation between us.

We pause every half an hour: 19.00, 19.30, 20.00, 20.30 & 21.00. When pausing we come back to our feet and give attention to the contact with the floor. We also acknowledge the Extended Circle.

We begin with the Practice of Doing Nothing.

19.30 pause.

Tuning. It takes time.

Before we play the first intentional note of this meeting, we give attention to certain body points and see if we can observe any unnecessary tensions and let go of them. For example the contact of the thumb/first finger with the pick, muscles of the face or our back etc. How much is necessary?

2nd Primary on the A string. Whole notes.

20.00 Pause. See if we can directly experience our feet without thinking about them, or having emotional reaction to them.

The Division of Attention exercise:

Picking one string.
Feet tap Left Right Right etc.
Count 3 bars of 4

All these in quarter notes.

We direct attention to individual parts.

Then we keep it all going and double the picking speed (8th notes) Observe if there are any changes in the body.

Picking 8th notes.
Keep going with L R R feet tap.
Now we count 3 bars of 5.

We also alternate between LRR & RLL every 3 bars of 5.

What is necessary? What indeed...

19.30 break

Left hand work. Observe what pressure is sufficient to press the string. Work on each finger individually

We play EC-AAD 28 bars (aka Tremolo) for SW.

Acknowledge the completion of the Extended Circle Project, which has ran for 3 months. Tonight was the 12th meeting.

The key words of tonight: directing the attention, observing unnecessary tensions - effortlessness, division of attention.

It was our 4th meeting with Marcin so far and the strongest one in my experience.

Meeting with guitars

26 December 2008
Tychy, Poland

GUITAR MEETING NOTES:

Present: Marcin & Jacek

We meet in Marcin's room. Begin few minutes after 15 o'clock with the Practice of Doing Nothing.

Tuning.

PRIMARIES:

The metronome is set at 75 BPM. Right hand work:

Whole notes.

Half notes, also played with the 'up-stroke'.

Quarter notes. We play 4 'downstroke' notes on the downbeat followed by 4 'upstroke' notes on the upbeat. There are 8 notes, and 4th and 8th are eighth notes which gives 7 bars in total. We work on discharging this while counting 4 bars of 7. Then we count in 3. A challenging exercise in the Division of Attention indeed.

Half note triplets, 8th notes, 8th notes triplets & 16th notes.

We alternate playing 4 bars of this and 4 bars when leaving out the fourth note in the bar. Count of 4.

Then we leave out every 6th note, which with counting with metronome (4 bars of 3) results in another DoA exercise - 3 against 2. Some notes are added, and the challenge increases, but it also develops into something more musical.

After this we work on the preparatory Third Relation exercise for the right hand. At one point we aim to play it more gently, doing only what is necessary, and the tone/sound noticeably improves. It would be good to have the guitar instructor here to check our hands out! (i.e.release...) While this is unavailable we just have to keep going and observing. 8th notes are gradually extended to 16th notes. We add the chord and practice them together, also with the mirrors.

This is gradully approaching the introduction of the TR, but at one point there's some misunderstanding, and thinking 'kicks in'. Too much talking, something is gone, let go of it.

20 minutes break.

REPERTOIRE:

ASTURIAS

Work on the main arpeggio. Half speed, normal speed.

THE EYE OF THE NEEDLE

After playing the piece through we focus on the last 3 bars of 5 and approach it as a Quality Exercise.

28 BARS (aka TREMOLO)

We review the form, practice the piece twice with the metronome. Then we play it.

At the end there's a spontaneous call to pause & send the best wishes to those who most need it.

Completion at 18.35. A good session. We worked hard, but also had some laugh.

Looks familiar

Carp boys waiting to become the main dish of Wigilia:



It's a common thing to buy them alive and keep at home, for example in this bath!

Travel

Unusual travel home this time. It's Saturday morning. A big hug to Marek before I leave, Belen is still asleep. First I catch the 8.30 am bus to Leeds Bradford airport. There was a change of schedule and now we leave from Manchester, but the buses are provided, so it's fine. There are 3 of them. On the bus I pick one of the two last places, and sit next to the guy (Kamil) that happens to be from Poland, traveling home to Wroclaw. Great! Immediately something clicks between us, the travel goes faster... At the check-out it turns out I have to pay extra for the guitar - £22.5. How wonderful, of course the price wasn't mentioned when I booked the ticket, another dissapointment and dodgy move by Jet2. The plane scheduled at 10.50 eventually leaves before 16 o'clock, but I take it as it goes, can't be bothered. Sleep through all the flight which is great (and without whisky!) I was planning to catch the night train from Prague, but arrange going by car to Wrocław with Kamil and his family, so it turns out to be quite a zigzag of a travel. I'm given the lift to the train station and say goodbye to Kamil and his family. We exchanged contacts in England and plan to meet in Leeds some time in January. Anyway, in Wrocław I have 3 hours before the train leaves. I hang around in McDonald having coffee and reading the weekly until 1.am until it closes, then stay in the main hall. Spontaneously I grab the guitar, tune it and play several pieces of Bach, Nueve Dias & Hope. The policeman looks suspiciously at my first, but I nod him and he nods back, fine. Wrocław train station - quite a peculiar place to be. The train to Katowice is due at 1.55 and it leaves on time. I can't really fall asleep, it must be that coffee. The travel drags. At one point I do a little DoA exercise. From there there's only one more train to Tychy. There's a new line running between the cities now, some of the stations are in use for the public again, for example one that is very close to my place 'Tychy Zachodnie'. I'm very happy to see this development, the travel is very comfortable, and the brand new train is nice and clean. It's dark and quiet in the streets, it must be Sunday! Exactly on 6 a.m. I knock on the door, my father opens. A toast and to bed.

last one

Last day at work in 2008. I manage to get up after nearly 4 hours sleep, and I'm not even that grumpy.

The day at work is ahead, 12 hours. And it goes by so quickly. In the meantime Ania visits in her new car, acquired yesterday. She gives me a short lift - I like it!

One of the jobs I have to see to is assisting one resident at the hospital. The number of different objects and devices packed in the hospital space is mind-boggling. All this is for some purpose here, functional and organized.

One of the worker is leaving job tomorrow, coming back to Australia. Always a shame when a good carer is leaving such a place, but on the other hand it's great to see somebody moving forward when it's time to.

After a shift I stay for a little while and read the excerpt from the Old Text to the new resident. He comments: 'he knew what He was talking about'.

At home: the central to the evening is the JOTD. I also eat, do a bit of packing, emails. Receive a response to the inquiry about the Function with a very useful reference to the Alexander Technique.

While I get the stuff organized the kitchen is boiling. M is on preparing some good stuff to be taken for his parents. Later on we meet in my room and talk until late.

Off to Poland tomorrow. I might post some occasional journal, but for sure I'll come back to daily postings with the first day in 2009...

catching up

It's 17th December today. Two weeks and we'll be into the New Year! And today is a break before the last day at work this year. Last 3 days were pretty intensive and I was shattered last night. I sleep in as planned this morning, and it turns out to be a long one. Can anybody help me out of this bed please ? I can't move.

Sitting, tuning. After this I have a cup of soup and call dad at home. He sounds good and tells me the story of the turtle (doesn't say if it was Siergiej, or Igor) who ended up on the back of his shell, and was unable to get up. Sounds familiar.

Then I'm off to get more Christmas cards and walk to visit friends and their little boy. He's growing so fast. We have a nice meal together made by G. They got the Christmas tree since the last visit. It's so big, but it fits well into this room.

I then walk to asda to get some socks. Ania is busy and doesn't turned up as planned, so this gives me some time to practice guitar.

Then my sister comes, tired, but very happy as she just acquired a new car! She also shares some plans, sound good! and then she's quickly off to night shift.

Home. Meal with Marek and Belen finished off with ... blueberry cheesecake!

JOTD.

I spend most of the day catching up with emails, reports etc. The amount of these increased in the past few weeks. I'm wondering if it's going to stay like this, or it's just temporary.

And for dinner is salad & soup. M shares some delicious goat cheese with me, mmm.

Also do some supplementary reading from DM about 'Function', 'Will' and 'Being' before moving into the 2nd chapter of 'E'. This made me reflect on the world of function/guitar. Questions arise and I'm very excited to explore these...

Late late night, and please don't ask me how am I going to wake up in the morning.

on the wave

A crisis morning. I'm late, but on time to make it for work at 8. No sitting, unintentionally.

A very busy day at work today. Because of the various trainings going on I work on one unit alone for most of the shift. And a good shift it is, quiet, focused, the sense of humour helps to keep going...

But also notice I can't help being sarcastic about the way the 'care plans' are maintained and approached here. They can be useful, but unfrotunately are not , not here, just seem like the waste of time. What happened to the common sense? I also learn that if you leave an open bag in the kitchen, for example mine, some residents might think it's a rubbish bin and leave something there, for example a used tea bag.

And there's the Extended Circle Meeting between 19 & 21 o'clock. One of the very last ones. This overlaps with the last hour at work.

Shower, email. Then speak with my sister, she does have some bad news, I call my mum, and so she does! It makes me reflect on the job of maintaining the balance within all this. Good news yesterday, bad news today and the challenge of remaining grounded and responsive to them, without being locked in the emotions. Untouched, but not indifferent? hmmm...

I eat, rest, practice guitar.

I'll be home on Sunday morning! Hurray!

And here's the song I recalled on my way back home, I did miss it!: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvNV5IxxB4A