EnriqueEnriquez
Dear all,
For our third exercise I would like to borrow some ideas from Luc Bigé's book "Petite diccionaire in langue des oiseaux." Although the book doesn't provides any historical background on the language of the birds, and I basically think he made the whole thing up, his take is useful as a departure point since he is basically organizing an understanding of how la langue de oiseaux, as a form of wordplay, can be used in today's French world.
Bigé points to something I am interested: the prevalence of shape and sound over meaning when it comes to the way our unconscious perceive words. I see this identical to the idea of the unconscious being affected by color and shape in the Marseille tarot. A sonic rhythm becomes a visual one, that's it. Then he goes into explaining what to look on each letter. Here I start having problems with his system. In some letters he will go by shape, but in some others he will detect symbolism. This isn't a coherent system. So, I reversed engineering it: based on my understanding of the cards, I am being able to see letters as shapes and derivate messages from them. Same principle, different methodology.
He says that all the consonants' shapes evolve from combinations of the vowels. This is very interesting from a graphic point of view. But then I thought: there are two axis, a vertical one (being) and an horizontal one (becoming). These axis united "above with below" and "past" with "future". Lets take the most minimal shape in our alphabet (the letter I) as reference, and establish it as "being." The letter I would represent the individual (not because the word 'individual' starts with an I, but because the letter I is made by one simple stroke). Now, lets assume that our sense of being gets reshaped by our sense of becoming. This is, when the vertical axis represented by the letter I is activated horizontal-wise, we have the letter I reshaping itself to form all the other letters in the alphabet. (I do this with the cards all the time. I look at the first card on a row, then at the last one, and ask myself: "what needs to happen for this image to become that other one"). Just as The Empress has to let her motherly energy erupt to become The Tower, the letter I breaks apart to become receptive to the ground and we have a letter A. When the letter I grows arms to embrace the world it created the letter B. If the letter I curves itself, forming a letter C, it becomes receptive towards the future. This way, by understanding the 'motion' that took place from the original vertical stroke to become a letter, we have a narrative we can share, and we get to meditate in our own names, special words, etc.
Proposed as a way to play with the letters to get unexpected insights, clean of all occult, or esoteric flair, This is useful. Based on this idea, here is our exercise for this week: I want you to pick a random word in a dictionary, and I want you to 'read' that word as a narrative. I want you to forget about the word's meaning or etymology, and base your reading in the way shape progresses letter by letter along the word. In other words, do as if each letter is a card.
Pay attention to:
- Optical rhythm: rising, falling, constant.
- Eye Rhymes among the letter's shape.
- Resonances among the letter's shape.
Look and react to what you see, not to what you think the word means.
As an reference for what I am asking you to do, let me share this:
Last year a guy named Guillermo wrote to me saying the he wanted to change his sex. I thought this was an unique opportunity to explore the unconscious messages in the letters on a name, so, I asked him which name he would like to have after technically becoming a woman and he told me he wanted to call 'herself' GIGGIOLLA. There were several things I noticed, but this were the two more relevant: Instead of one G, he/she will now have three. I envisioned the G as an O who breaks is perfection to reaffirm its ego, like pointing to his chest with her thumb saying "me, me, me." In the change of name, the self-indulgent would get triplicated! The other relevant thing is the elimination of the R. Literally, the R is a P with a little "leg" moving forward. Both shape and sound of the letter R suggest driven (RRRRRRRRRRR!). Instead of that he will now have only Gs and the two Ls. The L is an I that extends itself over the vertical plane, at a ground level. I took this as a gesture intended to affirm a terrenal, sexual nature. I saw him making himself completely passive, and getting rid of all his drive. On top of that I noticed that GIGGIOLLA can be separated in GIGGI and OLLA. Giggi is the name of a infamous, very tacky, TV actress in Venezuela, where this guy lives. 'Olla' means 'pot' in Spanish, like a cooking pot. The name describes then a bimbo-receptacle.
I wrote back to him explaining that I had compared the shapes of the letters in both names, paying special attention to the letters that were present in the original name and now were missing in the new name, and showed him how the new name suggested that he was making himself into a doll, or a sex-toy. The point wasn't to judge this person's hopes, or choices, but to to arrive at certain ideas by non-logical means so I can give him some things to think about. This lead to a powerful conversation about true motivations, an possibles adjustments of his plan. Interestingly, from that point on the guy started talking about "loosing my R", and "having to keep my R on."
This exercise is totally about looking. I hope it will help us to understand even better of how to approach shape instead of meaning by showing how, even something as familiar to us as the letters of the alphabet can give us messages if we see with new eyes.
It would be great if you can do this exercise, which is fairly short, and also follow Satori's example in the previous thread, by going through the whole deck or part of it while asking to each card "what am I missing", or any other question you find interesting to explore.
I also have posted a new essay on my Eye Rhyme site.
Have fun with this one! As usual, if you have any questions, please ask.
All the best, and thanks,
EE
For our third exercise I would like to borrow some ideas from Luc Bigé's book "Petite diccionaire in langue des oiseaux." Although the book doesn't provides any historical background on the language of the birds, and I basically think he made the whole thing up, his take is useful as a departure point since he is basically organizing an understanding of how la langue de oiseaux, as a form of wordplay, can be used in today's French world.
Bigé points to something I am interested: the prevalence of shape and sound over meaning when it comes to the way our unconscious perceive words. I see this identical to the idea of the unconscious being affected by color and shape in the Marseille tarot. A sonic rhythm becomes a visual one, that's it. Then he goes into explaining what to look on each letter. Here I start having problems with his system. In some letters he will go by shape, but in some others he will detect symbolism. This isn't a coherent system. So, I reversed engineering it: based on my understanding of the cards, I am being able to see letters as shapes and derivate messages from them. Same principle, different methodology.
He says that all the consonants' shapes evolve from combinations of the vowels. This is very interesting from a graphic point of view. But then I thought: there are two axis, a vertical one (being) and an horizontal one (becoming). These axis united "above with below" and "past" with "future". Lets take the most minimal shape in our alphabet (the letter I) as reference, and establish it as "being." The letter I would represent the individual (not because the word 'individual' starts with an I, but because the letter I is made by one simple stroke). Now, lets assume that our sense of being gets reshaped by our sense of becoming. This is, when the vertical axis represented by the letter I is activated horizontal-wise, we have the letter I reshaping itself to form all the other letters in the alphabet. (I do this with the cards all the time. I look at the first card on a row, then at the last one, and ask myself: "what needs to happen for this image to become that other one"). Just as The Empress has to let her motherly energy erupt to become The Tower, the letter I breaks apart to become receptive to the ground and we have a letter A. When the letter I grows arms to embrace the world it created the letter B. If the letter I curves itself, forming a letter C, it becomes receptive towards the future. This way, by understanding the 'motion' that took place from the original vertical stroke to become a letter, we have a narrative we can share, and we get to meditate in our own names, special words, etc.
Proposed as a way to play with the letters to get unexpected insights, clean of all occult, or esoteric flair, This is useful. Based on this idea, here is our exercise for this week: I want you to pick a random word in a dictionary, and I want you to 'read' that word as a narrative. I want you to forget about the word's meaning or etymology, and base your reading in the way shape progresses letter by letter along the word. In other words, do as if each letter is a card.
Pay attention to:
- Optical rhythm: rising, falling, constant.
- Eye Rhymes among the letter's shape.
- Resonances among the letter's shape.
Look and react to what you see, not to what you think the word means.
As an reference for what I am asking you to do, let me share this:
Last year a guy named Guillermo wrote to me saying the he wanted to change his sex. I thought this was an unique opportunity to explore the unconscious messages in the letters on a name, so, I asked him which name he would like to have after technically becoming a woman and he told me he wanted to call 'herself' GIGGIOLLA. There were several things I noticed, but this were the two more relevant: Instead of one G, he/she will now have three. I envisioned the G as an O who breaks is perfection to reaffirm its ego, like pointing to his chest with her thumb saying "me, me, me." In the change of name, the self-indulgent would get triplicated! The other relevant thing is the elimination of the R. Literally, the R is a P with a little "leg" moving forward. Both shape and sound of the letter R suggest driven (RRRRRRRRRRR!). Instead of that he will now have only Gs and the two Ls. The L is an I that extends itself over the vertical plane, at a ground level. I took this as a gesture intended to affirm a terrenal, sexual nature. I saw him making himself completely passive, and getting rid of all his drive. On top of that I noticed that GIGGIOLLA can be separated in GIGGI and OLLA. Giggi is the name of a infamous, very tacky, TV actress in Venezuela, where this guy lives. 'Olla' means 'pot' in Spanish, like a cooking pot. The name describes then a bimbo-receptacle.
I wrote back to him explaining that I had compared the shapes of the letters in both names, paying special attention to the letters that were present in the original name and now were missing in the new name, and showed him how the new name suggested that he was making himself into a doll, or a sex-toy. The point wasn't to judge this person's hopes, or choices, but to to arrive at certain ideas by non-logical means so I can give him some things to think about. This lead to a powerful conversation about true motivations, an possibles adjustments of his plan. Interestingly, from that point on the guy started talking about "loosing my R", and "having to keep my R on."
This exercise is totally about looking. I hope it will help us to understand even better of how to approach shape instead of meaning by showing how, even something as familiar to us as the letters of the alphabet can give us messages if we see with new eyes.
It would be great if you can do this exercise, which is fairly short, and also follow Satori's example in the previous thread, by going through the whole deck or part of it while asking to each card "what am I missing", or any other question you find interesting to explore.
I also have posted a new essay on my Eye Rhyme site.
Have fun with this one! As usual, if you have any questions, please ask.
All the best, and thanks,
EE
