Don’t Mind The Art
When following a spiritual path such as Zen, all moments are equal, and all actions are equal. It is simply a case of doing what needs to be done, and doing it wholeheartedly, with all of your attention.
The same applies to art. It is simple, and in a sense, everything becomes art (from the verb, “to be”). However, much of art in our culture is mind-orientated, with “the arts” such as painting and music and acting coming from ego, coming from a state of “what can I gain from these for myself?” It might be applause, recognition, money, but invariably it is not for the art itself, and so it comes from the mind. It is judged, it is categorized good or bad, and that is the domain of the mind: judgement. In this way, much of what is called “art” these days is created by the mind, with its judgements about what is good and bad, what is beautiful or what is popular. For true art to flourish, we must go back to the source, to the space and creative sense of being that is beyond the mind, that can hold the mind in its spaciousness and not be moved by it.
Michaelangelo said this best when he said “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” There is no sense of ego here, there is no conflict between what he wanted and reality. You might ask how you can “not mind” the art, and it’s easy, it just means contacting the source of creativity and not judging what comes out. You might ask how you can write without the mind, and of course, you can’t. The mind is needed for its knowledge of how language works. The key thing here is to remember that mind is not the source of the creativity, it is only the tool which helps to bring it into the world. Seen in this way, the mind is not unlike the pencil, with the hand behind it being the source. The mind in itself is not the problem, it is that we are asking the mind to do something which it cannot do, be a source of creation and inspiration itself.
I myself have stressed about this web site. I’ve had ideas for how I wanted to change the look of it, how I wanted to expand the sections into different designs to keep things separate for those who might want only to read certain subjects rather than all I produce. But when it came down to it, I saw (though not immediately of course) that much of what I wanted wasn’t necessary. Things could be done much more simply. And realizing that, I was able to drop my ideas and desires, though not without first seeing how much of myself I had invested in those ideas.
And then? Then I found peace.