Cord-Reading, A Bodying Practice
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About this ebook
Cord-Reading is the most ancient of all arts, its practice stretching back to the very origins of Homo sapiens. Part game, part divination, part art, the cord has fascinated societies around the globe. In this manual, Hughes updates the practice for the modern reader, describing how cord-reading can connect us with the creativity of our unconscious brain. Providing a step-by-step guide with illustrations, charts, and explanations, Hughes gives a thorough grounding for anyone interested in pursuing this art. As with yoga and ting jing, cord-reading calms consciousness, gradually allowing the whole person to enter into awareness. Hughes writes, "Creativity is not necessarily accurate. It is adaptive. Its answers require testing. If they prove ineffective, what other recourse does a person have other than to give up or create again?" Cord-reading is thus not offered as a panacea, but rather as a creative discipline that can enrich one's self-understanding. (www.bodywisdom.press)
Robert Hughes
Robert Hughes has been teaching Literature and Composition for 30 years. The interest which informs his work involves identity in relation to the environment. As Hughes says, words, also, make up much of our environment, as do our own actions. The creating of worded works effects (not affects) our environmental identity. Indeed (Hughes notes) McLuhan makes the point that our environment remains for the most part invisible and inaccessible. Hughes tries to make it audible. This effort to investigate and embody identity itself frequently expresses itself in humour and whimsy, but is no less sincere for that. For more about Robert Hughes, visit bodywisdom.press.
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Book preview
Cord-Reading, A Bodying Practice - Robert Hughes
Cord-Reading
A Bodying Practice
––––––––
Robert Hughes
Published 2018
Makete House Publishing
ISBN 978-0-9938059-7-4
––––––––
Copyright© 2018 by Robert Hughes
www.bodywisdom.press
pogonipmyn@outlook.com
––––––––
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or otherwise, without prior permission in writing of the Author.
Contents
Introduction
Reading the Cords
The Reader
The Disposition to Listen
Cord Materials
Cord Arrangement
Cord Basics
Cord Action Variations
Cord Domains (Colours)
Cord Domains (Actions)
Swelling
Transparency
Congestion
The Difficult Way to Enlightenment
Tempo
Texture
Shrinking
Hunger
Cessation
Openness
Pollen
Illustration of Eleven Relations out of Countless Possibilities
The Eleventh
The Twelfth
The Chord Scanning Format
The Fringe Scanning Format
The Balled or Knotted Scanning Format
Personal Knotting Methods
Impersonal Knotting Methods
In Response to Sceptics
The Reading & the Renderer
The Easy Way to Enlightenment
Deep History
Being Natural
Advanced Cord-Rendering: Two Tricks, I Forget, & Traits
Get any piece of string, yarn, or cord and begin knotting. Here are a couple of starter-knots traditionally used in the quipu of the Runakuna (the people ruled by the Inca).
C:\Users\Robert\Pictures\plain knot.jpgCord-reading involves tactility and texture, a touch-practice which you can exercise while you continue to read.
C:\Users\Robert\Pictures\figure 8.jpgIntroduction
The cord is ‘that which runs through’, originally intestine[1] in the Proto-Indo-European tongue of some 6,000 years past, subsequently of any string-like organic structure. In Old English the term was hropp (rope). As time passed, cord became synonymous with both the Proto-Indo-European sai- (sinew) ‘to bind together’, and the PIE ten-on (tendon) ‘to stretch’. Later, words such as vein extended the meaning to leaves, rock, metal, and in particular, the tendency of nature (again, Proto-Indo-European ten), including a person’s nature: that which runs through somebody’s way-of-being. ‘Nature’ derives from PIE gene- meaning ‘making it what it is’. And so, cord is the making of our making, on ongoing creativity rooted from our neuronal cells to our muscle fibres to our actions.
The word read roots in the Proto-Indo-European word re- which indicates ‘attend’ (PIE ad- toward + PIE ten stretch), and by extension, listen (hlysnan attend to something) and so ‘stretching one’s attention to something’.
Together they are cord-reading: attending to the making.
Reading the Cords
In ancient times in the Old World, the haruspex would ‘read the intestines’ of sacrificed bulls in order to prognosticate the causes and the exigencies of events (distinct from the bull). In the New World, on the other hand, the sukya was a type of healer who ‘listened to song’. The song formed the cord, that is, an ongoing structure of sound, such as chanting, which did not necessarily consist of reasoned discourse, but rather of intuitive connection, guiding the sukya to smoke treatments of the patient’s complaint. (In contrast to the sukya, the curandero specialized in herbal treatments.)
Cord-reading differs both from tarot, a procedure derived from a medieval Italian card-game, and astrology, which infers information from externalities (stars) and applies it to internalities (personality). While some might compare cord-reading to palm-reading, the differences are profound. For one, cord-reading is creatively active whereas palmistry is passive. In palmistry, existing hand-lines are your life-indicators, while in cord-reading, you yourself sculpt the cord-forms. Further, astrology and palmistry purport to reveal a fate in which outward circumstances entangle you, whereas cord-reading expresses your unique personhood – including your freedom – in action.
Cord-tying is an art. Reading
the cords is in itself a misnomer, because the cords must first be produced. The cords are plaited, interlaced, and knotted by an artisan on the spot. They are fashioned by a maker rather than merely scanned by a viewer. Due to this dynamic relationship of artisan and matter, the art of cord-tying-and-reading might be better understood as a form of discipline, such as yoga or tai chi.
The Reader
String-figures have been a common practice in many cultures around the world. In Papua New Guinea the islanders called string-figures ninikula. Such figures have mainly been recognized as cat’s cradles in children’s games. In fact, however, ninikula played much more serious social roles. They were made by people of all ages, and had a critical influence in organizing hunts, preparing ceremonies, arranging funerals, choosing marital partners, and so forth. They were also considered to have spiritual properties. A string or cord, having formed a figure, was considered to be ‘immersed’ in the life of its representation, and could influence human beings. Across the world from New Guinea, the Inuktitut word for string-figures was