15

Sounds of Life

The sense of hearing is a marvelous revealer of space. It is enough to close the eyes, to let this sense expand, to perceive that it is in tune with the greatest subtlety. If we let ourselves be carried by the wave of our perception, we can discover farther and farther horizons, to the limit of silence.

The quivering vibration of people’s voices opens us to awareness. Music enchants us and causes us to come into contact with our deepest emotions. It allows us to explore a choice realm where a peaceful mind allows itself to be won over by all-encompassing intuition. Music permits the body to move and regain its fundamental freedom of expression through dance. We hear with our whole body; we directly perceive the vibrations of certain instruments, which touch us like a caress or penetrate us more deeply.

We love to “listen to silence” or to the infinitesimal noises that inhabit the silent universe. These tremoring sounds calm us and make us sensitive to subtlety, to the opening of our being to the world.

“At the moment where your attention awakens through sensory organs, enter the spatiality of your own heart,” advises the Vijnanabhairava Tantra, stanza 136.²⁷

I open my sensitivity to the arising and passing of sounds that lead me back to my own plenitude.

I let my body respond to sounds, to music. I let my instrument be permanently in tune so that I can take part in the cosmic concert.

I abandon myself, surrender, to the sound of my own breath, to someone else’s. I communicate with the sound of the breath, which brings me space and peace.

I listen to others with total presence. My whole body listens and, beyond language, I hear what these bodies are telling me.