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A few months ago in preparing for a dharma talk at a plant-inspired sunset meditation session, I found myself googling in earnest, “do plants sleep?”
Why yes, yes they do. That’s why it’s called a ZZ Plant! …. *booiiiiing!*
Every sentient being has a rhythm, a circadian rhythm: a behavioral, mental, and/or physical response to a 24-hour light cycle here on lil’ baby planet Earth. Plant, animal, human, microbe (and all in-betweens and both/ands) inherently, naturally respond to the giant blinking eye of a world going dark and lighting back up, and then dark again.
Where does this rhythm come from? How do we know, how does it know? It comes from inside of us; it’s self-arising, or endogenous.
Circadian rhythm is a thread sewing us from our insides to the outside world. We are where are feet are; we are what we breathe; we are creatures of light and dark.
There’s stuff you do when it’s light out.
For instance, drink too much of a chocolate milk shake and then feel sick; photosynthesize; pick up a penny you found on the sidewalk; stew as you wait in line at the Post Office; maybe sleep. We’re nearing the longest day of the year, Summer Solstice, when you get to do so much stuff!
And there’s the stuff you do when it’s dark.
For instance, anxiously ruminate over an email you sent a few days earlier; play ghost in the graveyard; go to work; worship the moon; just chill; maybe also sleep.
And the in-betweens, dawn + dusk, have their own timbre, of course.
You know what you like to do during these ephemera. And all this stuff might be different for everyone, but pretty much guaranteed no one does the same stuff 24 hours a day, forever. Even plants. Plants are still plant-y, but their endogenous ability to sense fading then growing light enables them to track seasons, approaching dormancy and growth in the rhythm that’s best suited for them. Their rhythm, exactly as it is, enables them to thrive. They show up, they grow up, and move on. They don’t look back.
Understanding our own rhythms is like catching a vibe.
It’s not so much a formula as it is a listening and awareness. The rhythm is there, within us, pulsating, we just tune into it. It’s hard when we judge our rhythms; perhaps we have internalized it’s not what it “should be” — maybe we move too slowly or too quickly.
But just remember those judgments on our rhythms are external, in fact exogenous. And why shouldn’t we prioritize what comes from within rather than what comes from without?
Your rhythm is perfectly perfect just as it is. I have mine; you have yours; your plants have theirs; microbes have theirs. Like a great percussive symphony, we’re all vibin’.
Let’s zoom in here on the word rhythm itself, which is a true gem.
It comes from the Greek word rhythmos, meaning "measured movement, flow."
It’s the coziest word! When I learned about vowels as a kid, “y” was only a “sometimes” vowel. This fantastic word has five consonants and one part-time ambivalent vowel (and I shouldn’t assume, maybe Y is like “no, I’m not a vowel here!”).
In any case, it’s a word so dense, rich, and full it doesn’t need more space in the form of vowels or otherwise. Like Walt Whitman (and you), it contains multitudes.
I can’t spell the word without saying out loud to myself, “arr-aitch-wy-tee-aitch-em.” If you can, I mean, wow. Truly, hats off to you.
But for me, the process of enacting the word (typing it or writing it on a page) is a tiny little yabba-dabba-doo moment. A little rhyme to spit.
I recently downloaded a delightful app called Tap That Tempo.
My sister-in-law who’s a sound engineer tipped me off to it. You can listen to a song and, if you trust yourself to a keep a beat (that’s an if!), you simply tap the screen along with it to magically reveal its beats per minute, or BPM.
Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major is 74 BPM
Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody is 144 BPM
George Michael’s Careless Whisper is 153 BPM
Blink 182’s Rock Show is 195 BPM
It’s very fun and you can use it for anything.
When the day is finally over and I’m listening to the soft wheeze of my dog Mimi sleeping, that is 60 BPM. That is a rhythm of dusk, of unwinding and loosening.
When I recall someone I lost, for whom grief still feels so fresh that it rushes deafening into my ears, that is 180 white noise BPM. That is a rhythm of heartache, of a longer arc of light and dark.
When I stub my toe, fuuuuuuuuuck, that is 666 BPM.
A fetal heartbeat begins at around 100 BPM (maybe right around the time the circadian rhythm begins?). Then it increases to between 140-170 BPM around weeks 9 to 10 of gestation before it slows back down again to 110-160 BPM. A rhythm of rhythms, or a rhythmthmthm; a range.
This healthy range continues as we’re born and grow, navigate heart breaks, scares, heart attacks, or otherwise, until eventually it stops all together. 0 BPM, the sound of silence.
Incidentally I just went to the cardiologist for the first time in about 30 years (I’m fine). As a kid, I had both a heart murmur and a tachycardia, an incidence where your heart kind of randomly and erratically beats really fast (over 100 BPM, sometimes up to 200+ BPM). A normal heart sounds like “lub-dub” (or ga-gunk if you’re Johnny Castle in Dirty Dancing). If you have murmur there’s might also be a whooshing sound of some sort. It’s often not serious, and just the sound of your unique blood flushing through your unique heart keeping your unique body alive at its own rhythm.
Catch your vibe and dance to your own rhythm.
Yoga IRL weekly at Love Yoga in Venice and the Santa Monica YMCA.
Work 1:1 with me: sitting with the discomfort of transition; cultivating + elevating your voice; practicing yoga or meditation.
More plant-based meditations at Merrihew’s Nursery coming SOON!
More writing.
More snooping about me.
I loved this one. Bob just left the house before 9am and commented “wow, out of the house 2 days in a row before 9. This is not my style (rhythm) at all”. I have to admit I feel the same way. Stayed up last night til 12:30 watching Ted Lasso. Translated…we are just not morning people😊.