Chasing joy...

I think that what we're seeking is an experience of being alive....

Joseph Campbell

Joy Collector

http://www.lianneschneiderart.com/Art/Digital-PaintingPhotoArt/i-Bt57d5w/A

The great American mythologist, Joseph Campbell, in one of his interviews with Bill Moyers for the PBS series, "The Power of Myth," responded to one of Moyers' questions about human search for meaning this way:

         "People say that what we're all seeking is a meaning for life. I don't think that's what we're really seeking. I think that what we're seeking is an experience of life...so that we can actually feel the rapture of being alive." 

The "rapture of being alive"...how many of us have been blessed enough to truly experience that? And how do you go about finding that? Surely we can't all spend our time sitting around "navel gazing" as some have mockingly described the meditative practices that blossomed in the late '60s and early '70s when Transcendental Meditation was all the rage and everyone was looking for a guru to teach them how to reach that state of pure detachment that is "ecstasy" or joy. 

And in truth, we actually can't find it by "dropping out" or complete detachment as some envision it. We find it by the simple act of being truly present to our own lives, to the moments of our lives, being completely aware and mindful of those moments and most of all by being grateful for each one of them. Elizabeth Lesser (Broken Open, 2004) describes it as, "It is a willing engagement with the whole messy miracle of life." By that she means that one cannot find rapture or joy by avoiding the pain or the brokenness in our lives. Quite the opposite - one cannot find rapture without embracing that, looking into the face of our fears and anguish and being grateful for it. It is there, where we would least expect to find it, that we realize and appreciate the joy of living. One cannot appreciate light without darkness, become blissful about spring if there were no winter or dormant period, know love without its lack. 

Here's the lesson in a metaphor - a poem I wrote some time ago called, "The Joy Collector." 

The Joy Collector

Like a lepidopterist, I set out to capture joy in my net,

searching in all the usual, obvious places,

in the garden of blooms I’d planted to be

an enticement for the rare and fragile, wingéd creatures.

And once captured what would I do

with each uniquely beautiful specimen?

Wait for it to finish out its brief life in a jar filled with leaves,

holes in the top and then, when it was living no more…

pin it to the corkboard, fix it under glass,

this now lifeless collection on display,

catalogued and labeled for me to show off my skills

as a butterfly hunter, satisfied, self-congratulatory? 

But true joy can’t be caught like that,

remaining as elusive as a Palos Verdes Blue;

rather it catches you utterly by surprise,

comes from places and events you least expect

and seldom where you are looking for it! 

Don’t chase after it…a butterfly hunter with a net -

and when you are very still, within and without,

perhaps even looking wonderingly another way

at something beautiful that catches your eye

and fills your awakening soul with delight,

she will settle gently on your shoulder, 

flutter in your heart...and live.

  

© Lianne Schneider May 2011

Be grateful for the darkness, for the pain, even for the grief - when you can stand still in the midst of that, then you will find your rapture, your joy. In truth, one of my favorite poets, Khalil Gibran said it best nearly 1000 years ago:

Are you "first rate?"

“You cannot be really first-rate at your work if your work is all you are.”

Anna Quindlen 

Mockingbird Have You Heard

http://fineartamerica.com/featured/mockingbird-have-you-heard-lianne-schneider.html

In case you haven't noticed, I've spent a good deal of time in this blog advising - myself more than anyone else - how to live our artistic lives with integrity and purpose. And not just our lives as artists either...but more importantly life in general. I've given a great deal of thought in the past few years to meaning and purpose...to what the point of it all is. At the beginning of the year, I began my commitment to this blog with intention and along the way, I've explored with you the heroic virtues required for our sacred quest for a good life, a worthwhile life. I've spoken about success and motivation and goals. I've even spoken about happiness as if I had some answers different from those the rest of you have arrived at on your own! In the last post, we had some great exchanges about burnout - whether it's possible to successfully market ourselves without losing our creative edge and purpose. Whatever your answer to the question was, one thing is certain - we cannot be "first rate" artists/writers if that is all we are. Even the most successful of us cannot eat, sleep, breathe and market our art all the time or I would venture to say, it soon stops being "art" and becomes "work." 

Which brings me back to Ms. Quindlen...or rather to Maria Popova's blog about Ms. Quindlen's beautiful little book about life - "A Short Guide to a Happy Life." Quindlen, says Popova, "considers the question of the self and what makes us who we are, what makes us worthy of being...Even those trying to find their purpose, even those engaged in fulfilling work, and even those of us lucky enough to have no separation between “life” and “work,” can get consumed by our modern cult of productivity. Quindlen’s words come as a vital reminder of what matters, what counts, what the true aliveness of life is." 

You can read the rest of Popova's blog post here: http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/11/a-short-guide-to-a-happy-life-anna-quindlen/

And then you might want to go out an buy Quindlen's book so you can reread her beautifully intuitive advice again and again. "Get a life," she says, "Get a life in which you are not alone...get a life in which you are generous... All of us want to do well. But if we do not do good, too, then doing well will never be enough." We won't find our happiness in being or having nothing in our lives that is more important than our art or our writing. We cannot be happy if art is all we are and all we do. I think all of us know that already...but in the push to be commercially successful artists, we may find ourselves on that slippery slope at the bottom of which our art has become work and our lives are consumed with productivity and marketing, rather than an expression of our very human spirits and our desire to generously share the goodness we see all around. To be happy is to share our dreams and our passions and to inspire others to share theirs and most of all, to be truly, gratefully present to every moment we are blessed enough to have. 

...in the eye of the beholder.

“Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.”

― Confucius

Begonia Shadows
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/begonia-shadows-ii-painting-lianne-schneider.html?newartwork=true  

Years ago, Ray Stevens sang:

              

                  Everything is beautiful in its own way.

                  Like the starry summer night, or a snow-covered winter's day.

                 And everybody's beautiful in their own way.

                 Under God's heaven, the world's gonna find the way.”

For most of us, it’s easy to see the beauty in a delicate flower, a summer day, the sparkle of sun on the  water or the glory of a child’s smile. And as an artist, I wanted to portray that – the light within the natural beauty of the world around me. I couldn’t visualize myself creating something dark or moody, some abstraction of violence or negative energy. So I’ve often dismissed my own art as nothing but “pretty pictures” – without the depth or substance that artists who could present the darker aspects of life seem to have. And yet, I could write from that space – write of anger, betrayal, hurt, loss, loneliness and fear. Still when I went to convert those poems into images to go with them, I seemed to wind up with “pretty pictures.” Then it hit me…I took a good look at this painting, at its title, and I realized why I was so focused on light and pretty. As I painted from a lighter, softer photograph, I unconsciously darkened the shadows in these fluted petals. You see, the shadows are essential here. They provide the sharp contrast to the light within – without those shadows this flower would be one dimensional, flat and lifeless.  Instead, this begonia now looks as if it swallowed the sun. In life, as in art, the shadows are only important for the lessons they have hidden beneath them and for the stark contrast they provide for all that is hopeful and joyous. I realized, too, that I look for the light even within the darkest art and I always find it – a reflection, an edge, the sheen of a ridge of dark paint – and it is there I find the beauty of each work of art I see.  My own "pretty pictures" would be empty of meaning as well without the shadows to draw the eye towards the light. 

Still, it’s harder to find the beautiful in something very dark unless you have the inner vision to see it – like these two incredible artists whose black and white works are dark, mysterious, fearsome, even occasionally depressing…that is until you look closer…and find the extraordinary beauty in the light amidst the shadows.

David Foster aka Ragman whose work on Red Bubble and BlueCanvas will completely captivate you, mesmerize you...even haunt you will keep you spellbound for hours. Or go browse Bob Orsillo's portfolio on Fine Art America and get caught up in the awesome but beautiful power of his gritty black and white images.  

I look at these stunning, dark and yet powerfully beautiful images – and as Chief Dan George once said, “My heart soars.”