INSTRUCTIONS FOR A (GHOST DISCO)

1.

BEGIN THE GHOST DISCO

(DECIDE TO DO THIS)

Have at least 10 minutes to do it. Uninterrupted time. Or interrupted (it’s your life). 

2.

REACH BEHIND YOU

(THINK OF SOMEONE YOU HAVE LOST AND WOULD LIKE TO REMEMBER)

They may be lost to: 

• The past 

• Different continents 

• Death

• Who they used to be 

• Who you used to be 

• Beginnings 

• Endings

• Disappearance

• Time 

• Something never happening 

• Somewhere else

3.

YOU ARE GOING TO DANCE SOON

(CHOOSE A SONG)

This is the song you are going to dance to. It should feel like you want to hear it. Consider how you would like to dance with the person you’re remembering. 

Would you like to think of a moment 

or to sing 

Would you like to cry

Would you very much like not to cry

to sweat

to move fast and hard

to move soft

?

4.

THINGS CAN SEEM LOST BUT THEY ARE NEVER LOST ENTIRELY

(TIME TO THINK AND TO LOOK AT YOUR HANDS)

In each of us are two times. First Time and Second Time. 

Hold up your left hand, palm facing you

First Time understands itself. It is biological. 

We are born —> we live —> we die. 

It is shared by us all. It is linear and works in straight lines. It is indifferent to feeling and thought. 

Someone is alive or someone is dead 

Someone is here or someone is not here

Animals exist in First Time.

(Animals do not have philosophical problems)

Look at the palm of your left hand for a moment and know you exist in First Time 

Hold up your right hand, palm facing you (keep your left hand raised) 

Second Time does not understand itself. The time of our consciousness. 

Non-linear. Made from feeling and thought. 

Made from the understanding that we are conscious, alive and there have been others before us

Someone is here or someone is not here 

but 

That does not mean they are not with us 

They may be gone in some ways - in body or mind

Gone from this ground, gone from our arms, gone from this life

But they are here in others - in memory or feeling. Here in love, here in sleep, here in strange places

They are not lost entirely

And so they are  where?

Look at the palm of your right hand for a moment and know you exist in Second Time also 

Knit your hands together 

We are often caught between First and Second Time. Neither more real than the other.

Place your hands together, palm to palm

In this dance, time is nothing but ours. To take, to borrow, to stretch, to close.

In this dance, we are going to close the gap. Between us and them. Between absence and feeling. Between their hands and our heads.

Keep your hands together, palm to palm

5.

PEOPLE LEAVE THEMSELVES ALL OVER ONE ANOTHER 

(A PRAYER) 

Speak into your hands the following words. You may want to whisper. You may not. 

People leave themselves all over one another. 

It is not possible to lose someone entirely 

Not entirely 

You yourself cannot be lost entirely 

No matter how hard you may try

People leave themselves all over one another. 

This earth has been trodden before 

This breath has been breathed before 

There is life beneath the ground that we cannot see but upholds our living

We do not always need to see things for them to be there

People leave themselves all over one another. 

People leave themselves all over one another. 

People leave themselves all over one another. 

Breathe in deeply, air to your stomach

Breathe out, slow and slow and slow - release your hands

6.

CLOSETHEGAP

(PLAY THE SONG. DANCE) 

The song can be played aloud, in your mind, or any way you desire to play it

Know they are with you, as much as anything else 

Close your eyes

Or don’t

Dance with them, for as long as you can 

For as little as you can 

For as long as the song plays

For as long as feels right

Play the song

Dance

(Close the gap)

7.

DISENTANGLE

(THE DANCE HAS COME TO AN END)

Look to your left palm

Then to your right

Notice the gap

Notice you have the power to close it 

Then say goodbye for now

Using whatever words you’d like to use

Or don’t say anything at all

(the dance has come to an end) 

Thank yourself for dancing 

You have completed the ghost disco