Overwhelm

Beauty Heals

After a bad couple of weeks, it can be hard to get out of the turbulence of worry and obligation that continue to afflict the mind when it seems like the troubles will just keep coming. So when my brother suggested a trip to Longwood Gardens, even though most of me wanted to hide at home to avoid any more possible mishaps, I agreed, knowing it would be good for me. And it was. So many tulips in differently shaped and organized beds, kinds I’d never seen before and some so strange you wondered what was evolution thinking. Every part of the garden was perfectly kept, the arrangements of different flowers and plants flowing in harmony. Never throughout the day did I think about my troubles. Time in nature is known to be healing, and the careful cultivation of these gardens was inspiring. Beauty takes a person out of themselves, diminishing self-consciousness and cleansing the mind for a time. Tulips have always been special to me because of my memories of my grandfather being with the family when we would go to Sherwood Gardens in tulip season after church. That was when he was minister at St John’s Methodist Church nearby and he was the magnetic north of my heart, how I wanted to be. He had what I know now know is equanimity and a sense of humor, beautiful in temperament and behavior, a demonstration of the connection between beauty and goodness. So often discussion of beauty is confined to physical appearance, an arrangement of features, what Ram Dass would call the package, not the essence. Krishnamurti said a lovely face without love is ugly. I’ve seen people with perfect symmetrical features twist them out of shape with a snide expression and people animated by joy to glow. Perhaps it is the lack of love in the hearts of so many that allows people to thoughtlessly destroy beauty, of the earth, of relations between neighbors, of justice. Justice depends on correct proportions which is also true of beauty. Beauty my underlie our moral judgments, determining the unjust, unfair and destructive, ugly. Vanity blinds individuals to their ugly actions and choices. Beauty stimulates the beauty within because that is what recognizes it. Art builds sensitivity to beauty. We connect to the feelings expressed in an image and grow in our responsiveness. AI can make amazing images but can’t replicate human feeling. Only artists can keep the depths alive to educate our feeling nature, sense of appreciation and awareness of the feelings of others to move in harmony with our world.

Misguided Energies

Speculating on Consciousness

After reading an article in Scientific American about 29 competing theories of consciousness, I was both glad attention was being given to this important aspect of human experience but also felt strongly that more radical speculation is still necessary. As J. Krishnamurti said in one of his dialogues, “An intelligent mind is a mind that is not satisfied with explanations.’ Encouraging speculative thinking might build a rounder picture of a subject by interlacing what might have been considered tangential into a more three-dimensional view, a bigger picture. Even outrageous ideas, too wild to be credible, might spur ideas in someone else that use some of the same thought or relationships. The article had an information graphic that showed at a glance which theories focused on which aspect of consciousness and to what degree. How much I understood just from the diagrams helped me zero in on the ones with particular interest. This suggests to me that approaching consciousness with more visual mapping of relationships could offer more scope to understanding. Visualization is useful in showing how it all works together, the interlacing of information with the changing weather of mood and emotion. Linear explanation is not enough for the complexity of the subject. Perhaps we are one frequency band on a cosmic spectrum that includes all frequencies. One person that experienced a Near Death Experience said it was like slipping to one side, not going somewhere but still being there on a different frequency. The final words of a guru to disciples imploring him not to die and leave them comes to mind. He said “Don’t be silly. Where would I go?” Sri Aurobindo and others have suggested that consciousness has layers, planes attuned to particular kinds of awareness. The ability to shift states of awareness not only exists within an individual but could be expanded into a whole mind awareness beyond the personal. Speculation is needed in a time when the range of ideas and opinions has narrowed to only a handful of choices regarding the big ideas of being. Anything beyond mechanistic explanations has been taboo. Maybe let research examine older ideas, where consciousness enters the mind going back to Descartes and the Pineal gland, this singular center that regulates cycles. There’s been a suggestion that there is a regular wave that runs back to front in the brain. What might that be doing? Or opening channels with the universal ideas beneath all spiritual traditions o see if some of the metaphors cast light on areas science can investigate. Allowing a looser play of thoughts that doesn’t dismiss what’s outside current dogma could create space for more ideas with insight into consciousness.

Low-Grade Anxieties

Perceptual Changes

I remember often telling drawing classes that shutting one eye would flatten the scene making it easier to see the clear boundaries of objects without the competition of two views. What we used in the Illusionism class to create the appearance of reality were spatial signals that needed just one eye and were processed preconsciously. This was brought to mind by the illusions I’m working on in my painting. My sensitivity to spatial illusion is stronger. With only one eye the whole world is flat so the effectiveness my illusions is becoming more real enabling me to push them further than I’d envisioned. I knew I was successful when I caught myself holding the brush sideways to work on a plane that appeared to slant back from the painted surface. I’d fooled myself. The illusion of the slanted plane affected my behavior before what I know reached consciousness. This turned out to be a problem. My primary spatial reality is now based on one eye. The illusion I paint looks as real as reality. As the illusion gets stronger, I make more mistakes. Too often as my instincts turn my hand to the perceived angle of what I paint the result is a long mark where I’d pushed the brush sideways against the surface try to go deeper into the pit believed to be there. Before the mind is conscious of it, the body responds to the environment it sees. What I like about illusionism is its power to stimulate at that level. The unconscious adjustments that occur automatically are what creates the feeling of a scene. Without that feeling of space and separation between things, I’ve made many accidental marks with my brush on furniture that I thought was farther away. Coming to grips with all the difficulties of losing half of my vision, I’m also discovering some interesting new sensitivities particularly in my work. I’ve been able to take the illusions further than I could see before. Details look sharper, mistakes easier to spot. I’m grateful for these unexpected benefits and open to the possibility there may be more. My brain has been hard at work compensating, creating a sense that I see a whole scene even though most of the left side is missing. Filled out with what it does see and has seen recently it’s a relief not to be aware of the void depicted in the drawing below. It’s still greyed out and inaccurate but not empty grey. The brain’s remarkable ability to reprogram itself, to adapt its circuitry to the existing situation begins its adjustment immediately. Learning is what’s its plasticity is made for. This situation is giving me plenty to learn.

Impermanence