Thinking in the language of cosmoses

Further thinking in the language of cosmoses... It occured to me this evening that during the time when I was deeply involved with acquiring and listening to and learning and understanding and getting into memory works of classical music that each work was seen by me at the time as an individual contained cosmos.

By that I mean, each work - or each recording of works (and I would intentionally look for recordings that contained complete sets of a particular work rather than recordings that just contained a mish-mash of individual pieces by a composer or composers) - each work was a contained cosmos I was acquiring and could hold in my hand.

You see the difference by contrast when you hear classical music just by chance on the radio. It has none of the power it can have when you are focused on it as separate, contained, individual cosmoses.

The same is true for books. A book can take on much more power for a person when they adopt it as their own and don't just read it but absorb it to a degree other books don't get absorbed and see it in its whole (and see the parts - know the parts - in relation to its whole). The book then takes on its form as a cosmos and delivers more (for good or ill, depending on the book).

It's the same with any influence as well. The Work as an influence is the same. To see the Work as a cosmos requires a level of time and effort and valuation and engagement - not to mention doing - and understanding-developing that the usual desultory reading and gabbing about the Work doesn't produce.

These are just some observations on the language of cosmoses and seeing in terms of cosmoses. The example of classical music in particular is dramatic for me. I use to seek out and make extended efforts to find specific recordings of specific works and when I got them it was like I was holding a living, powerful, contained influence in my hand that could deliver something of a high, inspired nature. That was what motivated the search and the effort to listen and understand and get these great works of music into memory and understanding.

The contrast between that and the act of hearing classical music on the radio, in a background sort of way and in a non-intentional sort of way, where you can see how the music loses all the power it had for you when you were in the other mode described above makes it clear what the difference is: in the former effort each work or set of works became a living, contained cosmos for you. The latter experience (the haphazard listening to it on the radio non-intentionally) is hearing the works in a form where they are not individual, living, contained cosmoses, and hence have none of the power of delivery of their influence.