Tuesday, April 26, 2011

What Does the Naked Eye See?




One thing I have learned is that any enlightenment I have attained is not so much the result of noble pursuit as it is waking up to the fact that my face has been in the dirt for a long time and maybe I don't really know what I'm doing and it's time to get up, brush myself off and have the wherewithal to listen for what I don't know.






Were we to suspend our personal perspective, or at least our attachment to our personal perspective, a good question to ask might be: "What does the naked eye see?" With this question we enter the world of symbolism. As we simply be with what is in our midst, from the stance of the naked eye, we would not bring evaluation or assessment, we would bring curiousity and simple interest, synonyms for "not-knowing". This would allow for seeing something new. The artist must develop a tolerance for the discomfort of not-knowing, because as she exhausts her known ways of creating and the piece is still not working, she must allow the muse of creativity to educate her as to the next step, the next brushstroke, the next note. She is basically listening for the next choice, the answer to: how to proceed?

Listening from this realm of not-knowing, with mental attention turned away from the noise of the stored data of the intellect, and turned toward listening simply through the silence of the "naked eye", insight emerges. New possibility is heard and brilliance radiates: "Life is always singing" (B. Regnier). Inspiration unfolds, taking the form necessary for the fulfillment of the creation: painting to be expressed, words to be written or spoken, parenting to be done, business plan to be developed, patient to be healed. New realities and new realms emerge from the Source of everything and no thing. Empty and meaningless morph into what is needed, according to the character of the thought of the need. We become the conduit through which the creative Source forms Itself. We allow transformation to express through us into our worlds.

~ excerpted from the paper, "The Creative Process: A Portal to Not-Knowing as the Non-Verbal Language of Transformation", © 2010 Laura Basha, PhD



~ ten thousand blessings to you ~

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