Funk Dharma: The Righteous Path of Groove
Transcending the illusion of separateness through rhythm
Funk Dharma - Image by Author (Microsoft Designer)
Funk has always been dear to me. Its raw, pure groove speaks to my soul. My love for this style has led me to look into its roots, finding a path that mirrors my growth.
The term “funk” has held various meanings since its first documented use in English around 1620. It originally denoted a strong odour and later came to signify a state of depression or ill-humour, as in "in a funk." In African American culture, while still linked to body odour, it also embraced positive connotations related to sweat and effort in music-making. The genre of funk music emerged in the mid-1960s, characterized by rhythmic grooves and an emphasis on danceability, blending elements of soul, jazz, and R&B.
Funk and Dharma
Picture a funk player, deep in their art like a fighter on the path of dharma. Each note is a fight, each beat a step to higher ground. Sweat runs down their face, a clear sign of deep drive, of a soul joining with sound.
Bhagavad Gita 3.43 fits this image well:
"Thus knowing oneself to be beyond the senses, mind and brain, O strong-armed Arjuna, one should steady the mind by clear spirit-led thought and thus—by spirit's might—beat this fierce foe known as lust."
The player's inner war is between perfect and chaos, between order and mess. A fierce drive that turns sound into a cosmic dance. Each note played with fire is a blow against the foe of not knowing.
Bhagavad Gita 4.42 sheds more light on this path:
"So the doubts that have grown in your heart from lack of knowing should be cut down by the blade of wisdom. Armed with yoga, O Bharata, stand and fight."
Each show becomes a gift, an offer on the altar of making. Their sweat, like holy fire, cleans and blesses each note, turning the plain into the grand, the human into the godly.
Raw and authentic
It was in the 1900s that I saw the term "funk" make its big move into the world of music. I watched it grow into a style that stresses off-beat rhythms and deep grooves, with a clear sound that still makes my soul shake today. This shift of the term fits what funk means to me: something raw, real, and hard to ignore.
James Brown, whom I see as the true "Godfather of Soul," played a key role in how I grasp and love the style. Through his music, I learned how to strip sound down to its most basic parts: rhythm, groove, and pure feeling. His skill to make each beat and each note ring with a truth that is both deeply personal and widely felt seem like pure magic to me.
When I hear James Brown's best songs, I feel as if each note, each shout, and each drum hit is a direct voice of my soul. It's as if Brown had taken the core of that "funky" smell - strong, lasting, hard to ignore - and turned it into a sound that rings deep in my being. His music is sweat, it's hard work, it's pure and wild joy, and I feel it flowing through me.
Sahaja
For me, funk is much more than just a type of music; it's a way to show my true self and wild spirit. It's a return to my most basic roots, a way to link with something bigger than me through rhythm and motion. When I lose myself in a funk groove, I feel like I'm "fleeing" from the limits of my daily life, just as the first meaning of the word hints at.
This deep link I feel with funk has led me to look into other ways of thought that praise being true and wild. It was during this search that I came across the teachings of Vedanta and, in particular, the idea of "sahaja" talked about by Ramana Maharshi.
Ramana Maharshi, an incredibly wise man from India in the 1900s, has deeply shaped how I see the world and my spirit quest. His lessons on finding oneself and looking inward have opened new views on how I grasp life.
The idea of sahaja, which I learned means being natural or wild, speaks right to my soul. The thought of living in a state of easy being, lining up with my true nature, free from the limits set by the ego, fits well with what I feel when I lose myself in a funk groove.
I found that Ramana Maharshi often talked about different states of mind, especially various types of samadhi. Sahaja Nirvikalpa Samadhi, a state where the ego is fully gone, really caught my eye. The idea of living naturally in the world, acting without effort and seeing no split between myself and the universe, seems very much like what I feel when I'm fully lost in funk music.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj and Richard Wagner
When I listen to the great tracks of James Brown and all those old and new funk music, I feel an almost godly link to the rhythm of life. The flaws, raw energy, and natural flow of the music echo my Vedantic practice of embracing my true self. James Brown's words,
"The only thing that can solve most of our problems is dancing,"
speak right to my heart. It shows the power of rhythm and motion in lining up with my true self. Each beat of a funk song is a party for me now, a reminder to live truly and embrace the natural flow of being.
Thinking on these ideas, I found a strong phrase from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj that further grew my view:
“The mind creates time, time does not exist if an observer does not. If time were to not exist, like it does not for a photon of light, all places in the universe become the same place".
This view deeply shook how I grasp reality, stressing how my mind builds my sense of time and space.
This idea hit me hard, leading me to think about the nature of time and space as things made up my mind. During this time of thought, I made a surprising link with another work that has always drawn my mind: Richard Wagner's "Parsifal."
In "Parsifal," I found that Wagner looks into a mystic change where time is not straight but fluid, bending and joining with the idea of space. This change seemed like a strong symbol for spirit growth, where the bonds of time melt away, showing the endless nature of being.
The exact phrase from Wagner's "Parsifal" that deeply struck me is:
"Du siehst, mein Sohn, zum Raum wird hier die Zeit,"
which means
"You see, my son, here time becomes space."
These words, spoken by Gurnemanz, a knight of the Holy Grail, in the first act of the opera, opened new views on how I grasp reality.
And...so?
Thinking about this phrase, I can't help but feel a deep link between Wagner's thoughts and those of Nisargadatta Maharaj. Both ask me to go beyond my usual grasp of time and space, much like how funk music goes beyond the bounds of usual rhythm and tune. They urge me to see that my true nature is beyond these things, more in line with a timeless, spaceless state of pure mind.
In this light, both Nisargadatta Maharaj and Wagner point me to a deeper and wider view of reality, where the lines between time and space blur, asking me into a state of deep unity and awareness. It's like how a funk jam can start with a simple beat, but as players lose themselves in the groove, time seems to stretch and shrink, making a music space that feels endless and boundless. This insight is a reminder that the bounds I see are just tricks made by my mind, and in the big picture, everything is linked in a smooth flow, much like the weaving rhythms and tunes in a funk piece.
This mix of ideas - from funk to Vedanta, from Nisargadatta Maharaj to Wagner and the Bhagavad Gita - always reminds me of the beauty and depth of life. It moves me to live each moment with more awareness, to find rhythm in every part of my life, and to seek that deep link that goes beyond time and space. It's a non-stop journey of finding and growing, an endless search into the nature of reality and myself. In this journey, music, deep thought, and art join in a grand mix of understanding that keeps making my life richer in ways I could never have dreamed of.
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