On Liminality

In the strictest sense, liminality refers to the state that you are in during rituals that move you from one state to the next. Or something like that, I'm not an anthropologist. In the modern world, few people encounter many of these rituals. They of course still exist (or at least in a close enough sense). Take the rituals of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (hence called Mormon because I don't have time for political correctness and you all know what I mean). I can think of two that might qualify: baptism-confirmation (the movement between outsider to member), initiatories-endowment (movement from the lower law to a higher law). I thought that sealings may count but on second thought, probably not. There's not really a point when you lose your old status. Honestly even the endowment might be stretching the definition but whatever. And yet, the actual time spent in a liminal state for each ritual is small. A child might spend mere minutes between baptism and confirmation; an adult maybe a day to a week. From initiatory to endowment (or even just from the beginning of the endowment to the end? The end of initiatory to the beginning of the endowment?) is a couple of hours. That's not a long time, since these rites of passage, these rituals are not all consuming.

But liminality in the strict sense isn't what I want to talk about. There's all sorts of times in life, in my own life for sure, where people, like myself, sit in between states, at loss of an identity. In "popular" culture there's a lot of talk about "liminal spaces" such as hallways, airports and train stations where everyone is in transit. The gaps between our destinations. They fascinate certain segments of the internet. But that's not what I mean. I'm talking about certain life stages that people may or may not reach. Aspects of progression wanted (or demanded) by culture and existing between them. It's a subjective liminality, nested liminality, relative liminality. 

Here's an example from my own life. I finished exams in early May, but graduation wasn't until the end of the month. For a few weeks, I existed in this sort of liminality. I was neither student (nothing to study for, no obligation to go to classes etc) and yet I had not yet crossed the threshold to become a graduate. I was nothing (and it felt good, fwiw).

Another example. I will finish my last class in about 6 weeks (give or take). At that point, I will not really be a phd student. However, I don't become a dissertation until I complete the arcane ritual that is the proposal defense (or quit, that's the other way to escape the liminality). Stuck in the middle, neither student nor researcher.

Singles wards are something of a liminal space (especially at universities but I digress). Composed of people who are not children (in fact, from most points of views are adults) and yet not fully entered into adult society. There's a constant churn, people moving in and out, people marrying, even people divorcing. Of course, no one is forced to go to the singles ward but even outside of it they'll always still be in that state. In this sense, the singles ward isn't the cause of the liminal state and the discomfort that comes from being in it. Rather, it is a refuge for those in liminality, those trying to find their way out of it. A place for rituals of the liminal to escape the liminal. Or not.

Life is a liminal space, from an eternal perspective. At some point we begin the ritual of exaltation by coming to Earth. With that comes the stripping away of our divine identity; the veil makes us forget all. We become nothing but the dust of the Earth. We exist in this space but eventually get our memories, our identities back. Some find it sooner than others. Some never complete the ritual. But we all exist in this space for the time being.

Death is a liminal space. Lincoln in the Bardo was a weird book that I only like 3/4 listened to but it does do some interesting things with the idea of death being a liminal space. That being said, from a Mormon perspective death is still a liminal space. You've lost your body and all the good (and bad that comes with that). In prison or paradise, you're stuck until the resurrection. Unable to fully move forward.

Liminal spaces are in liminal spaces. I've existed in liminality for 10 years, mostly but not entirely as a consequence of my choices. I could have tried harder to advance, to cross the threshold, but maybe I've been too comfortable. Maybe it simply wasn't time yet. So I've waited, I don't know for what. And waited. Stood around and waited more. Looked the threshold in the eye and then turned around (and what a good thing that was!). Waited more. Watched others cross, some quickly and some slower. Some had been there before me, some long after. Waiting and watching and waiting and watching and waiting but never crossing and rarely making movement to. Almost more a guard than a participant (or a prisoner?)

Putting all that aside, thinking about this earlier inspired a new song. i stared across the liminoid abyss but made no eye contact. I was thinking about this idea about life being a liminal space but also being full of liminal spaces. More specifically, I was thinking about thresholds we choose to cross (or not). Train stations are sort of the prototypical liminal space (and give more choice than an airport) so I decided to use waiting for a train as a metaphor here. Or more specifically, tell the story of someone waiting for a train but being unsure if they wanted to get on it. Wrote the lyrics pretty quickly and they sounded sort of morbid so I decided to give the song a ridiculously emo title (which of course has meaning on multiple levels). Of course, I had to sample "mind the gap" because it's an iconic subway feature but also because a liminal space is literally a gap and the song is about someone minding that gap, instead of crossing it.

At first I was unsure if I wanted to include this on Fishing for Birds or leave it for Doctrines of Annihilation. Doctrines of Annihilation is meant to be an album about (among other things) depression after all. But it's also about salvation and healing which isn't really whats going on in this song. Fishing for Birds doesn't have an explicit theme but looking back at the songs that have made it on, it does have this underlying idea of growing up, of moving on, of change and how some people change faster than others (and some don't change at all). In a way, the whole album is about liminality. So this song makes a lot of sense for it after all. And at this point, I really just need to finish two more songs to call it done, which is nice.