The Glance

I began reading Rumi again lately.  I believe that the American professor of poetry and creative writing Coleman Barks has written some of the best books on Mevlana Celaleddin Rumi.  “The Glance, Songs of Soul-Meeting” is one of them.  It is as if Coleman makes a different side of Rumi visible.  The Rumi that we get to know in Turkey, through Turkish text is a little different.  Maybe the truth is that what the author believes who Rumi is, is reflected in the interpretation as well as in the energy of their books.  Isn’t that how we behave most of the time as well? Regardless of the words we use, what we mean, what we intend to say comes across more strongly.  And we share as we see and understand...

Today “The Glance” reminds me of a totally different book, “Blink” by Malcolm Gladwell.  “Blink, The Power of Thinking without Thinking”.  The main idea in “Blink” is what use in my consulting and complementary therapy work.  After years of training and working with hundreds of clients in Turkey and over the world, I have to admit that the answers to most of my clients’ questions do not come from a text book or a training or from the teachings of one of my masters.   Most of the answers come from the insights of the clients themselves.  If I feel that it is necessary, I also share what I see or sense about the situations.  My answers and theirs answers usually come in an instant.   And that instant for me usually comes in the first few seconds of meeting the client or in the few seconds after a question is asked. 

There is a special kind of knowing which may come through years of experience, but it also comes through reading, receiving information that is always available for all of us, all of the time waiting to be received.  Being aware of the fact that there is always more data than that which can be measured by our five senses, helps.  We do have another or rather other senses that feed us information, and very valuable information.  The information is always coming.  Are we aware of this inflow?  Are we listening? The answer to that question makes all of the difference.  “Blink” has a lot more to say.  As I am reading it for the fourth time, I am becoming aware of the details I had missed before.   There are parts that I would like to share in the coming weeks.

Malcolm Gladwell writes so fluently, it is not possible to admire and also a bit jealous.  How he connects all of the details is quite amazing.  The famous child and adult psychiatrist Prof. Yankı Yazgan was in Fethiye on May 2^nd this year as one of the guests of the 5^th Fethiye Culture and Art Days.  I came from and went back to Istanbul with his that day and we had a lot of time to talk and share.  I was starting to reread Blink on the plane and he told me about some of the details in the book.  Dr. Yazgan said that although the medical and research information shared in “Blink” have been known for quite some time, he also admired the way Gladwell shares so much information in a way that is both detailed, but easy to read by a wide audience.  Dr. Yankı Yazgan himself has ten or eleven books in Turkish.  One of his books is being translated into English and hopefully will be out by 2013.

*

Rumi is a lot of different things to a lot of different people.  Many people in touch with spirituality feel connected to him.  Want to connect with him, his thoughts and energy more.  I cannot say that I started to feel more and more connected to him after I started to learn energy techniques such as Reiki.  I felt more connected because it was as if his words were resonating in me, around me as I was reading the words that he left behind.  The strength of the energy of his words, especially his poetry affected me. Like the words of a special prayer, some of his poems come to my mind at the most unexpected times and I find myself reciting, quietly or out loud.  Not all of his work, not all of the words that are told to be his.  But does that matter? Not really.  Because also his energy is present in the most unexpected occasions and places as well.  There is more that what meets the eye and still it is never something I am able to totally get used to. 

*

Like cool, fresh water Rumi washes me clean from the meaningless chatter in my mind...

Stay together, friends.

Don’t scatter and sleep.

Our friendship is made

of being awake.

The waterwheel accepts water

and turns and gives it away, weeping.

That way it stays in the garden...

Stay here, quivering with each moment

like a drop of mercury.

*

Let love lead your soul.

Make it a place to retire to,

a kind of cave, a retreat

for the deep core of being.

*

Begin

This is now. Now is. Don’t

postpone till then. Spend

the spark of iron on stone.

Sit at the head of the table;

dip your spoon in the bowl.

Seat yourself next your joy

and have your awakened soul

pour wine. Branches in the

spring wind, easy dance of

jasmine and cypress. Cloth

for green robes has been cut

from pure absence.  You’re

the tailor, settled among his

shop goods, quietly sewing.

...

I wish all of you a week filled with peace and joy.

Zeynep