These few recent weeks were somewhat hard for me—and not just for me it seems. Most of my friends and colleges tell me they've been feeling same recently. Many people tend to look for the reason and the explanation in the stars: it's all because of the constellations...
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The stars
Understand me well, you can blame it on the moon, the stars, or on anything else if you want—it may even be somewhat true. But when I see people reading their horoscopes and just believing them blindly, I'm done. Leading your life according to some guidelines given by some fishy astrologers leaves a huge space for manipulation. If you have many people reading and believing horoscopes, you have a society that can be easily manipulated and steered. But I guess that's the risk of any mass-scale religious or quasi religious movement.
While we're on the topic, there's an article worth reading by Jules Evans. Jules is a practical philosopher, as he calls it. While his academic interests are mostly about philosophy, what's different to him that he tries to apply philosophical concepts and ideas into everyday life. While this may sound fishy at first, I've been reading his articles for few months now and think he's an honest person with a lot of valuable insights. And while I do not agree with him often, I still enjoy the food for thought his articles are.
In the recent text I’m beginning to suspect astrology may be bollox, Jules tells the story of how he used to believe astrology and took it really seriously—and how he started to doubt that later in life. Worth reading for sure. But astrology is not the main topic of my post.
Distance: the good and the bad
I think today's world lacks distance. “Say what?!” you might think to yourself—but let me clarify. Distance can be good or bad. The first one might change your life, life of your relatives and maybe even change the world (a bit). The other is destructive: it destroys your mental health, it destroys relations and deteriorates the world. Having said that, I think the world lacks this good distance.
Especially in the times of corona virus, we have the physical distancing in place, it's hard to travel and meet our closest ones. Technology is presented to us as a great substitute for this aching distance, but it only makes things worse. It's enough to think of today's internet tribalism, meme wars and how this can lead to violence on the streets. A lot of destructive distance.
It might appear at the first sight, that to combat this distance we'd need a lot of closeness. Seems obvious, right? I think not. False closeness can arise when one tries to get rid of the aching distance by destroying it with its opposite. It can lead to things like this idealistic, utopian belief that it's just a matter for “spreading the love” over the world, by making everyone love each other, and then it will all be fine.
However, I don't think that this is the case. I believe that a healthy closeness can only arise from a solid foundation, which has to be laid first. And I think the foundation is this good, constructive distance.
I think the very word “distance” can be understood by reference to one's attention. You see, we can put our attention only to things which are in some distance from us: literally and metaphorically. You can't read a book by stuffing it into your eyes and you surely wouldn't enjoy a movie if you had to sit few inches from the silver screen—in fact you wouldn't see almost anything at all. The mind is like a camera lens. If you want to make a beautiful macro shot, you first have to move away from the object and mount the proper macro lens.
Or think of animals. After all we're not that different from them. What would happen if you stumbled upon a stranded dog that was scarred of you? Try to approach him too quickly and get too close too soon—you're sure to be bitten.
Okay, so where do we start?
Looking for distance
The problem with the distance is that it's somewhere else for everyone, because it's not a place—it's a state of being. I might be too close to something that you are far away frome and vice versa. Therefore, no one will be able to tell you where the distance is and how to get there. You have to find the road by inquiring yourself and looking for things, ideas and people which you might be too close to—or too faraway.
So, once again: where do you start?
Let me answer with some poetry. Rumi was a medieval Persian-born Islamic scholar and Sufi mystic. He is fairly well known in the world and his poetry was translated into almost every language. It's a good place to start.
There's a poem of his in a book that I have, simply called “Silence”. I could not find the poem in English, so I'll make an impromptu translation from Polish:
Travel, even though there is no place where you shall arrive.
But do not try to see what's over the horizon there. (...)
Instead, travel towards the within, travel to the inside,
and do not travel to where leads the fear.
In another poem, he also writes:
Die drowned in the new love. The road only starts on the other side.
(...)
Die and be quiet! The silence will be the proof of your dying.
Your old life was a stampede from the silence.A silent and full moon arises in the sky.
For me, silence and nature are oftentimes what helps me to find the road. I think it's a place where everyone can, and probably should start.
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Arkadiusz Salwowski's “Distance”
All of the reflections from above came to me while I was working on the release of the “Distance” album. It's a new 9-part ambient work from Arkadiusz Salwowski, and a third release ever from LOŻA Oficyna—a small independent music label which I run with few friends.
I really got into the music itself and the whole concept that the author had for the album. The title not only refers to the author's personal feelings, but also to the distance between all of us, especially at this time of uncertainty and social isolation.
Not unlike T. S. Eliot in his iconic “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”, Salwowski depicts a world clouded in solitude and captures the current state of mankind: not only isolated within its own consciousness, but also trying to cope with the devastating effect of industrial civilization on the human spirit.
But there is also a sparkle of hope hiding there among the predominantly dark music. This sparkle seems to flicker especially brightly in the last track of the album, called “The Endless Road”. For me, the whole album is a story on looking for a healthy distance, finding it and finally realizing, that it's an endless road. A proper distance cannot be attained once and for all, but requires a constant reevaluation.
360° Music Video
I tried to put all of the above into a music video which I made for the track. As the music itself progresses, we are gradually moved into the growing distance—from a noisy and crowded city, through remains of a once might castle on the outskirts of the city, and into the woods. The vision ends with a might sunset.
A silent and full moon arises in the sky.
The video has been recorded using a 360° camera, which I luckily could borrow from @hallmann and am very grateful for that. All shots were taken in southern Poland: you can see the city of Nowy Sącz and the ruins of Tarnowscy's Castle near the city of Tarnów. The woods and the sunset were recorded in the lovely village of Wola Krogulecka.
You can see the video below, although YouTube still has not processed it for it to be available in 2880s resolution. It's only 1080s for now.
Also, it's recommended to view the video using VR Headset for full experience.
If you read the article all the way to here: thank you. I hope you enjoyed it!
Summer is fast approaching. Take some time to spend some time in the nature, “die and remain in silence”. Great things might arise from it. I hope the video might encourage you to.
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Good job :) I like the castle hill in Tarnów, but the last view is the best.
Thanks, I enjoyed making the shots for the most part. The hardest part was keeping an eye on the camera at all times, so it doesn’t get stolen or pushed by anyone. And also waiting for 2-4 hours for the time lapse to be done :D But I’m happy from the final result. Cant wait to see it using VR headset in KBK!
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