This blog needs an update. Something about the same post being up top for too long bothers me. Depending on what it is I guess; enough of that...
I meditate quite often these days, ever since the nerve-debilitating medical treatments of '07, when I got back into it initially just to calm my ass down a bit, and it seems to have a quality or aspect in common with fasting - which I dabbled in back in the 70's - in that no matter why you undertake the practice its broader or deeper effects are likely to come along for the ride. I guess whatever calms you down and brings increased serenity is bound to free up deeper movements. Maybe if you're so inclined.
So the medical crap finally wore off a bit and the meditations began to actually be somewhat revelatory, you might say; deeper feelings, strange experiences bordering on the profound. I'd been reading a little about enlightenment/awakening experiences and not really understanding much, so it was quite a surprise the first time I found myself in the silence. Reminded me of when I was a kid going swimming at the community pool, diving down in the deep end and trying to sit on the bottom; all the noise, voices, racket is muffled up there on the surface, and down here all around you is this beautiful, otherworldly quiet. My interest deepened...
Uh...worldly experiences can stir up the deeper stuff, too, often in a "whether you're ready for it or not" type of manner and I've been dealing with that sort of thing the last few months, recovering and getting increasingly serious about the...um, let's call it a quest, and let's say it's implied by meditation, ultimately anyways. This has led me closer - internetwise - to certain teachers of Awakening so that - even though I'm not really inclined toward guided meditations - I've found myself participating in a couple of those lately, one a live stream just this past Sunday.
Adyashanti's "True Meditation" recordings showed me a simpler, more direct approach to turning inward, sensing the silence/stillness than my typical method (TM basically) and opened "me" up to a feeling that my back yard (since the back door was open during most of this, I guess) and maybe the whole neighborhood, existed within me. Now, the one Sunday was with Eckhart Tolle, a live event publicized on FB and Sounds True website and who knows where, with who knows how many people participating. I mention the many people because in the past I've found that meditating with a group somehow can intensify the experience, and that may have had something to do with what happened this time. He seems to be a very good teacher too. That mighta helped. Either way - or both...? - I found the entire world within, and so much living energy that felt like it contained the potential to heal anything...
I don't want to talk about it too much but suffice to say, the stillness/silence is so present now, I walk around in it...
And then? And then, I jumped up and went into the studio to push out a piece I'd had in my head for about a week, and when it was done it looked like it shoulda been a doodle on a piece of scrap paper. So I decided to - considered - wiping it off to use the canvas over later. But something made me want to smear some of the paint left on the palette up there first, see what that did. It was like a dam broke loose and that "whole world inside me" feeling started splashing out all over the canvas. I's almost laughing and literally painting with both hands at once. I was amazed. Don't know what else to say except, if you don't like that painting, the one at the top of this post, you're just gonna have to blame the whole dang world! ;-)
