So, it takes over 100 hours of banging to change the dimension of an object.
That is, if you bang something hard enough and long enough, it can change from something that is flat, to something that is round. Or something that is inert, to something that is alive. Or maybe even something that is loathed, to something that is loved.
I know this as evidence-based fact and I have the result of what can happen when banging long enough is done. The fact was given to me as a gift at the end of the term, late last year. Rather than layered in festive trimmings, it was given wrapped in a simple calico cloth. The banged out gift came with a reason, a story and a hug. The reason was for twirling. The story told of a before-banging, flat piece and the after-banging shaped piece.
The hug was for love as well as accounting for the 100 hours in between.
My gift was a bowl. A free standing, inner-twirling copper bowl. It stands less than 8cm high and reaches only 20cm across the floor – but when I look inside it’s walls, I can see myself moving to groove circles and shapes into it’s sides. I like to hold this gift of the bowl, moving it around with the palms of my hands. Watching it’s soft contours change with the different moods of the day. Under the moving light, it’s twirling walls colour themselves in shades of reds and golds and greens. And while it’s been banged for over 100 hours to create it’s soft and rounded shape, there’s not a obtuse dent or harsh scratch in sight.
The banging has been ordered. And tactical. And necessary.
And in the reasoned, story-infused and methodological banging of power and love – a breathtaking beauty has been formed.
Think forearm balance, standing twists and balance.
To truly and deeply transform the inherit deeper structure of something, sometimes we have to bang it. Sometimes it needs to be banged hard. Sometimes it needs to be banged long. But an over-zealous hand can easily break what has the potential to form. Just as stepping away to soon denies the possibility of what may come. Banging and coaxing and shaping something long enough can not only make a flat piece of copper round –
It may even quieten and still a twirling mind.
We are now into a new year. With it comes all the rhetorical resolutions we write on the open, blank sheet of our mindscreen. Our self-spoken, self-help mental notes. Asking of ourselves to be fitter or to be healthier or maybe even to be just a nicer representation of the human race. Sometimes we can work at it – all the while wishing for the our “New Year” transformation to be quick and relatively painless. But real change takes time. And real shift takes banging. My gift came from a big bit of aggressive angst (power) mixed with a whole lot of loving shape-shifting (heart). This alchemy created form from that which was unformed. A known from that which was unknown.
The Real from that which was unreal.
I love my twirling, copper bowl for it’s simplicity and it’s complexity. I love my friend who gave it to me wrapped in nothing but calico and heart. I love that it’s flatness has been banged away over the hours she worked and it is now held together with coils of old communication wires weaved with strands of stories and sweat. The bowl asks me to confront my limits and transcend them. The bowl asks me to confront my fears and face them.
The bowl reminds me to open my heart fully and rest deeply in the twirls and colours of true love. Forever grateful for each precious day to be honoured as a gift from the Divine.
Happy New Year 2016.
I’m ready for you.
x