the mysterious space is as silent and real as an imaginary conversation

and yet

like a fertile valley
where two slopes meet
in conversation

the root of life takes hold
heaven and earth

enduring succession of continuous
interchanging

the mysterious space is always there
waiting for a director to use
its inexhaustible gossamer strength

—Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching; An authentic Taoist translation. translated by John Bright-Fey

The mysterious space—it is that place from which all things spring forth and to which all things must return; it is the birth place of yet tapped potential; it is the ocean which contains the Ouroboros; it is home to all human inspiration, sudden comprehension, revelation, insight, and wisdom. And it is indeed mysterious, lying outside the boundaries of time or space.

Can such a thing be real? Only as real as an idea or an, “imaginary conversation.” But that begs a question: what does “real” really mean? Something tangible? Physical? Measurable? Perhaps, though if so, then one must conclude that all things abstract, intangible, and narrative are but falsehoods.

And yet . . .

Is not material reality affected by mere notions, ideas, perceptions, and beliefs? Do Heaven and Earth not touch when one is moved by a sudden spirit to strum a guitar, to sing, to dance, to put pen to paper, to put paint to canvas? What are art and innovation if not the emergence of formerly hidden properties from the bridge between the objective world and the subjective experience?

Those who have been this bridge know of what I speak: the reversal of opposites—the repeating inversion of conscious and unconsciousness. One opens his “bodymind” and his “heart spirit.” Sinking beneath the surface, he dreams though awake, plays, produces, and creates; then he emerges again and bears witness as if for the first time to what, ostensibly, he just participated in generating—yet he says it came not from him but through him. He swears this, that it was not some contrived effort of the ego, but a connection with something mysterious and omnipresent, lush and fertile yet timeless, hardly visible yet unstoppable, so much stronger than its ӕtherial appearance suggests.

Lao-tzu. “Chapter Six”. Tao Te Ching; An Authentic Taoist Translation, translated by John Bright-Fey, Sweetwater Press, 2014. p.14