Beautiful! I adore how this work reveals deeper truth. The Alan Watts track together with the music describes it well in words and feeling. Truly beautiful.
I've builded one in the sea with hard wind. I had to be leaning into the wind. When it was finished people came to take look at it and one was standing between the stones and the wind. I told my father: look when he moves the wind will be back and it will collapse. And it did. Michael you were my inspiration to start this! Thank you very much.
For any one looking for Subtitles, I couldn't find them, but here's more or less what I can get, any corrections are highly appreciated. Let's consider breathing. You can feel that you breathe deliberately to control your breath. But when you don't think about it, it goes on. It's an involuntary impulse. So we come to have a very arbitrary definition of self. That much of my activity which I feel I do. And then that doesn't include breathing most of the time, it doesn’t include the heartbeats, it doesn’t include the activity of the glands. Do you or do not do these things? Now if you get with yourself and you find out that you are all of yourself. A very strange thing happens. You find that your body and else that you are one with the universe. In other words, that the so called involuntary circulation of your blood is one continuous process with the starts shining. If you find out that is you who circulates your blood, you will at the same moment find out that you are shining the sun. Because your physical organism is one continuous process with everything else that’s going on. Just as the waves are continuous with the ocean. It’s all you.
I don't want to sound sour or anything and this man deservers his dues. But there's a man in San Diego, Mexican descent, possibly Native American who has been doing this for over 2 decades at Seaport Village.
actually there is an entire global community of practitioners. every continent except antarctica thus far. as far as i understand this is an ancient practice, as old as humans have been building with stone. however widespread knowledge of practice is becoming much more well known since the beginning of social media and photo sharing. i'm sure there are several humans that have been doing it longer than the guy in san diego, and so on. tis possible you can find a marker for him if you look on the google map i have on my website. hundreds of markers. less than half complete. on the 'community' page.
Michael Grab You're the fucking man, you could utilize your resources and make millions of dollars, email me if you're interested in making money on this art! Sales@icylean.com
yep, the guy at Seaport Village also defies gravity (tames it? harnesses it? opposes it?), by stacking really big heavy stones. I'd call him a rock wrangler. I think Mr. Grab makes him look like a gifted novice though, in that he finesses the stones to balance for him. He's the rock whisperer.
Hey Michael, I just installed a rock art exhibition at the FCAI in Mn including an homage to your rock balancing.Your videos are great! Thanks so much for the inspiration.
Alberto Perfetti Acutally they do, but I'm impressed that it's not even something that happens often enought to make it futile to try to stack them in the first place.
Ok so I understand how he balances them up there but what I want to know is why do they stay there for so long? Surely a small gust of wind is enough to topple them over. Can someone please explain this to me? And I don't want to hear anything about meditation just physics. Thanks.
ryderthefrog when you have such a big object like a rock (boulder) balancing on a set of smaller rocks, as long as the center of gravity is going through all the rocks perfectly, the rock on top will keep it all in place because of its sheer weight. It might look unreal to the eye, but because of his perfect balancing between the sides of the rock, the center of gravity is going through from top to bottom like an arrow pointing down. don't know if that makes sense :P basically, any object has a center of mass, and if you find that point, and with a lot of practice, you can balance things in this unreal way.
MrKix Digress a bit before giving your an answer. Let's say, if he manages to balance a couple of light feathers one on top of another, yes a gust of wind will or even a light motion of the air around will dis-integrate the whole thing. Now, do I still need to answer your question? If there is a gust f wind and it is a very strong one, the whole thing will topple. But with light wind, it will most likely not, because the whole thing is heavy. How long it stood there, nobody knows, because it is edited and it is a video.
A highly talented human being! Absolutely fascinating video footage. Everything about this is incredible, and I found this very inspiring. Well done! Excellent work! More please 🙋🏻
Hey Michael. I love what you do; it is really cool! I am just curious, how long do your pieces usually stay balanced (assuming that there is no human interference)?
awesome stuff man! Alan Watts lecture fits nice at the begining. Does the swinging motion you do with your hand after finishing the piece at 1:30 and destroing it at the end somehow mirror what Watts is saying a bit later about the Human-Sun causality/duality/quantum entanglement/alltheUNIVERSEismadeoutofhippiesandunicornsconnectedtogetherbyaspookyactionathedistancetermidontknow? Have you even thought about it? curios high person asking @.@
Watching your videos nourishes my soul. Your art is beautiful. Like the best kind of game, you are playing with ALL of the natural elements which are ever dynamic. You catch it artfully with a camara to share it with us and then it is gone from that place but forever captured in our memories. Thanks.
Great video! Relaxing and empowering at the same time. Giving a nice feeling of eternal life although the action of forces of destruction and the inevitable transience of every single creation. And the possibility to master and enjoy this subtle balance ... Thank you so much :) just what I needed right now.
Lol for some reason watching him stack up these rocks was really soothing. But I'm so impatient I'd never be able to spend an entire day walking around rocks lol. Great editing too
"The human gaze distinguishes everything earthly: a small blade of grass, a fierce beast and a stone with a slow thought. Mysterious inexplicable power he is full of" "Did you say that every stone has its own pulse, rhythm? - Yes, and he beats in one day -- once. - Is this true for all stones or twice for some? -- The pulse of all stones beats the same" Anastasia "Ringing Cedars of Russia
Traducción apróximada: Pensemos en la respiración. Puedes sentir que respiras deliberadamente para controlar tu respiración. Pero aun cuando no piensas en ello sigues respirando, es algo involuntario. De manera que nuestra definición de “quienes somos” es muy arbitraria. Gran parte de las actividades que creemos que realizamos, la mayoría del tiempo no incluyen la respiración, ni los latidos del corazón, ni la actividad de las glándulas. Entonces, ¿Uno hace o no hace estas cosas? Ahora bien, si te tomas un tiempo a solas contigo mismo y te das cuenta que eres TODO de ti mismo. Algo muy extraño sucede. Te das cuenta de que tu cuerpo y todo lo demás que eres, son uno solo con el universo. En otras palabras, que la mal llamada circulación involuntaria de la sangre y el brillo de las estrellas son procesos continuos. Cuando te enteras de que eres tu quien hace circular la sangre de tu cuerpo, en ese mismo momento sabrás que eres quien hace brillar al Sol. Ya que tu organismo físico es un proceso continuo con todo lo que pasa a tu alrededor. Al igual que las olas son continuas con el océano, tú eres “un TODO”.
E (quilibre) = M(ickael) C2/ Grab + zen² !!!!!! but this is crazy ! you have to "feel" the balance point ??!!! are you a Buddhist? you practice meditation? you feel the balance point !!!! stéphanie (france)
There are people in this world who when stumbling upon one of these rock formations and didn't see who created it, they would assume that it occurred through evolution after billions of years.
Seriously, you need to go on "America's Got Talent" & you WILL win !! This is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen! I read the article about the trouble you were having in Boulder, Colorado & am happy that it was all resolved ! Never stop doing this! Brilliant!
People are marvelous but this illusionary world is holding us back from achieving bliss. There will always be gifted individuals in this system but as humanity we can all be blissful if we leave this "survival of the fittest" concept, because right now we are nothing more than animals with fancy toys. P.S. stacked rocks = mechanical equilibrium
Amazing. Coincedental I just filmed someone who does this for a living. Maybe you know him. Great Shooting and stacking. My dad learned to do this late in life. He had cancer and it helped calm him. I think I'll take it up again. Thanks for the video.
It's not "the" or "some force"; it is the same gravity God created to keep the galexies, stars, the planets, our sun (a star) and the moon all in alignment. Gravity, an amazing thing; but not by evolutionary chance--it is by intelligent/omnicient design.
There's a guy in Lyme Regis, Dorset, England who does this on the beach with much bigger stones. Like absolutely enormous ones. Just as impressive but in a different way.
Hi Michael could you tell me who the sound track is? The vocal I'm intreasted in. Amazing what you do, I can see so much spiritual potential in the art x
beautiful. . whatever skill you have the government should make you a part of their negotiating team to prevent conflict cause seems you have found some inner centre, some peace with which you can affect your environment
10 years since watching this video and being inspired to try! I cant imagine not having this tool! some days you just need this kind of meditation to enjoy a beautiful moment in life!
hi im at uni doing a project a lot like what you do in this video to do with how rocks fit together and the shape of them and all those thing, it would help me a lot if you now the names of any other people that do what you can ?? and it amazes me what you can do with out using any glue or something to keep the rocks together im very impressed +michaelgrab
finally watched your 2012 "Rock Balancing Demo"..... i'm just wanted to say i'm a huge fan! keep up the awesome work and hopefully i'll be sharing my own balancing videos soon!
