December 5, 2004

Artwork

It happened again. This afternoon I was solitary, immersed in my artwork, when time turned into timeless, function dissolved into form, self forgetting self. Small thinking suspended, I was taken beyond myself into a quiet world of pattern, color, light and creative energy. The hours slipped away.

I don’t think about what happens in my consciousness when I am absorbed in this way. But I do know that when my ego recedes, when I’m not thinking about self, time, or facets of local awareness, there is a creative freedom and energy present. This capacity to enter realms of heightened and inspired creativity is available to me when I become quiet, immersed, and surrendered. Silent and open, creative sacred energy is present.

7 comments:

Joe said...

It is so delightful to discover that this space, which is here and now and empty of a mind-identified self, is warm and intelligent. This empty (yet so full and vibrant) space is our original nature. Call it Being or Silence, call it Love, Beauty, or Graceful Presence, call it God.

Anonymous said...

My heart sings with the meeting of another new friend. Thank you for finding me, Meredith.

This no-time space you are in with your art is the same one I live in with my healing work. Like Al, I worry sometimes that I am too attached to it, to the fluidity and the transcendant beauty. Then I remember some Buddhist teachings, that's it's better to be attached to something good than to something bad, until you're ready to be attached to nothing at all. Anyway, I'm not sure it is attachment. It might just be a wish that everyone experience and live from this true place.

Mahala~LuminousHeart

isaiah said...

Your afternoon unfolded as poetry in motion. Being in the moment; in the here and now, lost to our notion of self as Self unfolds is the ultimate 'ceaseless prayer'. How odd that society typically seems to only recognize this state of being as it relates to sporting achievements (being "in the zone" they call it.) An artist can be in this state of being throughout most his or hers lifetime- to various degrees. When I hear others speaking of 'the inability to connect to anything meaningful in their lives' I want to shout to them, "it's because you are never still enough, silent enough to forget about you!"

May you always connect to Spirit as easily as this afternoons’ experience. May you always be open to the creative energy that is you no matter what facet it may show you. I would like to see some of your work; where can I see some examples? Thank you for your kind words about my photography- I, too, sometimes lose all sense of myself when I see through my camera's eye, as well as through writing and music.

Meredith said...

It is a delight to have this communion with all of you - a blessing that we share this resonance.

My friend Akilesh wrote: "Reading Graceful Presence this morning, I was struck with how this space of Presence or being or God, this most precious treasure, is so veiled in us; it lives in us in an apparently distant way; how our true nature appears foreign and fleeting in our consciousness; how we feel far from it; how when I move toward acknowledgment of this space in any dialogue, intimate or casual, it almost always proceeds “through a glass darkly.” This could be heard as whining or arrogant superiority, but I am a nobody. Having realized this nobody-ness, letting go of my desperate clinging to ego fixation, I am filled with the most exquisite and subtle bliss, and a warmth and intelligence that goes far beyond this small mind-emotion-body complex, this self I identify as me."

With these words, I am further encouraged to move within this space without veil, where 'I' is forgotten, where my truer nature is able to create, dance and play, where time becomes timeless, where light is radiant. This is the zone, the true place, where poetry is in motion, a ceaseless prayer. This is bliss.

M

Marjorie said...

thank you for sharing this bliss with us. "when my ego recedes", yes, thats where I find happiness as well. Sometimes it recedes so easily, effortlessly, its gone and I didn't even notice it -- bliss. Other times, now matter how hard I try, the ego refuses to go. Quit trying, perhaps.

Larry Clayton said...

Beloved, we are all after the same thing. In Christian vernacular it's called being led by the Holy Spirit. Ah! if we could be there always. Not yet; there is still growing to do: pain, suffering, frustraton, and in the midst of it HS.

I have to witness my own experience. Last night, after a dull and aimless day, I awoke at 2, and it was there. No more sleep. (That's often when the 'creative event' comes for me.) Blogging a mile a minute. Thousands of things to say to anyone who may hear me.

As Meredith said, "This capacity to enter realms of heightened and inspired creativity is available to me when I become quiet, immersed, and surrendered. Silent and open, creative sacred energy is present."

Yep! For me it's most often in the middle of the night.

The other time is praying with cardiac patients, which you've already heard of. On those occasions ego is gone-- replaced by HS, self, emptiness-- whatever you want to call it.

Hurrah! As my childhood favorite put it: "we're marching to Zion, beautiful, beautiful Zion..... the wonderful city of God."

Thank's for reading my mutterings.

Handsome B. Wonderful said...

I would love to see your artwork as art is an imprint of the soul.