The Kentucky Tragedy and the God of 0.001 Seconds
It happened at the end of last year. While the world was swept up in the festive Christmas spirit, I was facing a grave decision: the peaceful yet desperate dilemma of when exactly to eat the Kentucky Fried Chicken that had just opened in front of the station. In the end, I missed the perfect window on the day itself and waited for a later date to finally sink my teeth into that secret blend of herbs and spices.
Fate, however, is a cruel mistress. I thought my years of experience would at least allow me to handle a few pieces of chicken before a lesson, but my digestive system staged a violent mutiny.
The profession of an instructor often demands a grueling solitude. While battling the "time bomb" ticking in my gut, I stood before my students—who remained blissfully unaware—ready to begin the session. Drenched in a cold sweat, I could only curse my uncontrollable body: “Why now? Why at this exact moment?” It was a mocking reminder of "timing"—something that eludes all calculation and prediction.
In my recent lessons, I’ve been exploring a very challenging approach: “Dancing the Intangible.” Dance is, at its core, a formless act—a ritual of giving shape to invisible energy. However, teaching improvisation, where there are no counts and no set movements, is extremely difficult. There is no "correct copy" to follow because the dance exists only in the continuous flow of the moment.
This is where that 'little tragedy' at the Colonel's modest portion shook me awake with the raw pulse of life. Our bodies, and our expressions, don't always follow our logical commands. To truly understand this gap between our "plans" and "reality," I found myself returning to the ideas of Henri Bergson—a philosopher whose work I have long admired.
Bergson’s philosophy helps us navigate this difficulty. Bergson viewed life not as a collection of static, mechanical parts, but as a fluid, ever-changing flow. He proposed the “Élan Vital” (Vital Impetus)—an explosive force that gives birth to something entirely new. In the context of dance, moving according to a manual is merely the reproduction of "dead time." But when something truly "descends" during a performance, it is because this vital leap is happening in the immediate present—the moment where past and future merge into a single, living movement.
Modern physics and its “Uncertainty Principle” also echo this. The moment we insert a "thermometer" to accurately measure something, the very act of interference changes the state of the object. The same is true for dance. The moment self-consciousness creeps in—asking, "Does this move look beautiful?"—or the moment you try to logically calculate your next step in an improvisation, the pure thermal energy of the moment escapes. The dance ceases to be a living pulse and turns into a mere "explanation" of a movement. To put it in another light, the moment you become conscious of someone’s gaze or try to contrive the "correct" move, the vital spark that fuels the dance simply vanishes. The "beauty" at the root of life and expression is an incredibly fragile and elusive thing—it dies the moment you try to fix it with cold logic.
Conversely, while the value of the thing itself cannot be measured, it somehow harmonizes with the world outside. I believe this is a crucial perspective when trying to capture dance as it exists within time and space.
Even in embryology, we see this mystery. DNA provides the sophisticated blueprint, but science cannot find the "site manager" who decides exactly when the cells must begin to form the heart. Who gives that "0.001-second go-sign"? I believe "the mystical" resides in these timings that belong to no one, which even science still cannot fully explain.
The "package" of dance skills we work so hard to acquire is like "decorative wrapping paper." Fundamentals are essential, of course, but they are only the vessel. What truly matters is your "way of being" that remains after you have discarded the form. When you shed the noise of self-consciousness and harmonize your internal "go-sign" with a timing that exists only in that instant, the dancer becomes transparent. A beauty emerges as if "God/something great" has taken up residence in the movement.
I told my students: “Those who have the courage to dive into this ‘unknown harmony’ and let go of form will inevitably become better dancers.” When the circuit to this fundamental mystery is opened, a supreme healing occurs—a state of being in harmony with oneself and the world. Perhaps that very harmony is what humans truly mean when we call something "beautiful."
Perfectly harmonized beauty is so natural it may go unnoticed. We catch its edges through "transience" or "fluctuation." In aesthetics, there are forms of beauty other than what is generally considered "neat and pretty." It can reside in the uncontrollable tremors of the body, or even in that "violent mutiny" of the gut I experienced after KFC—a raw, overwhelming vitality that defies our ego. Ultimately, what they all share is perhaps a sense of awe. I invite you all to turn your eyes toward that mystical timing, where life truly breathes.