For your contemplation—a “koan” by the writer and Episcopal priest Cynthia Bourgeault:
The kingdom of heaven is not later,
it is lighter . . .
And this by Peter Matthiesssen:
“like that waterfall on the upper Suli Gad
that turns to mist before touching the earth
and rises once again into the sky.”
The Snow Leopard, p. 176
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There’s a form of kungfu called Shǎolín Mìchuán Qīnggōng (少林秘傳輕功) or Shaolin esoteric lightness kungfu that, when cultivated, brings about a lightness of body that enables dazzling leaps that soar and glide high and long, and other seemingly gravity-defying acrobatics. The names of some of the skills suggest the buoyancy and lightness of this practice: Leaping Light Gong, Super-distance Light Gong, and Water Flying Gong. The abilities can be pithily summed up as: “Go with the Float.”
The three items above are instantiations of what I call — levity.
Webster’s dictionary gives one definition of the word “levity” as “lightness or gaiety of disposition, conduct, or speech.” Another meaning is defined as “lightness in weight” or “buoyancy.” This definition of levity, as lightness in weight, especially as the action of a counter-force that is the opposite of gravity, is the meaning I intend.
Gravity is a “down” force—a force that causes, when the time is ripe, the fall of such things as apples, and also keeps our feet planted firmly on the ground. Gravity is what makes a bushel of apples hard to lift. Gravity makes things heavy.
Blow on a dandelion puffball and watch the gossamer seed puffs sail away in the breeze. Inflate a yellow balloon with helium, release it, and behold as it floats up, up, and away. This is levity. Levity makes things light.
Levity was once a scientific term, and the Oxford English Dictionary defines it thus: “. . . a positive property inherent in bodies in different degrees, in virtue of which they tend to rise, as bodies possessing gravity tend to sink.” If gravity works through a quantum particle called a graviton, then the quantum particle for levity is the leviton, a particle that waves along at the speed of light. Celeritas!
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HyC