Coming to terms With the heartbreaking reality of creativity That inherent in every form Is the necessity to divide & distinguish That inherent in every door Is the possibility to be shut in That inherent in every structure Is the threat of being enclosed That inherent in every quilt Is the potential of being unraveled And it is this reality That haunts me in my shadows And it took being consumed by my own shadows to show me that this too Was a manifestation of divine mercy Too transparent for my eyes -too accustomed to stability- to see It was an invitation into my formless essence That my residual attachment to form Tried to convince me that I wasn't ready to accept It was the painful and embodied realization of humility That was the antidote to the crippling perfectionism I craved all along The humility that I will never be able to hold absolute truth in my hand for all to see That it was a categorical error to assume that one key of form could unlock all the locks inherent in form That a metaphor could capture the totality of the nuances of the experience of liberation The humility that What is redemptive is God-given And medicinal for a context That what is Divinely bestowed is to be received with grace not with grasping And that an un-purified mind & fearful heart Will project fault on even the most useful form That the essence is unsullied Even if my perception of the form is That there is a secret to matter That is too subtle for the grasping mind to appreciate Thus the gift I bring back from the shadows Is the awareness of subtlety The awareness of transparency And how confused everything gets when we lose sight Of how seriously we take what was made to be light
A river illuminated by lanterns…
Welcome.
Momentos on the path is the continuation of a lifelong journey of collecting insights along the path of personal revelation. For the past few years, I have filled notebooks and sketchbooks with maps, diagrams, and meditations on the nature of reality & experience. At the same time, the creation of this virtual space marks a transformation in the way this project is carried out – a change beyond just a mere shift in medium.
This change in form(at) arose naturally from a recent change in my understanding of the role of insight & creative expression in my life… a shift in perspective born from the realization that I have experienced the following situation countless times:
I return to a journal or phone note that I had written years before containing a poem, reflection or quick note. It conveys a poignant flash of insight that I believed I had only recently realized for the first time in my life.
Seeing those seeds of wisdom from the past so perfectly support my current place on the spiritual path has clued me into the amnesic nature of the human experience. I may receive a momentary insight or idea that resonates with me deeply and has remarkable therapeutic effects & I may have phases of feeling very aligned spiritually… And re-discovering those momentos from the past has taught me that as long as I am participating in the world of time, identity and appearances, I will continue to experience cycles of alignment & remembrance and disorientation & forgetfulness.
Forgetfulness feels like distraction, like being weighed down by the happenings of the world of appearances, like feeling trapped in my own head, like feeling jaded by reality.
Remembrance feels like mindful presence, like playfulness & flirtiness, like exploration, like a spaciousness that allows for anything to arise within the self without threatening the peace…
When I had my first tastes of remembrance, i tried to hold onto the feeling for as long as i could. Now, with more experience, I am learning to accept and relax into the inevitable undulations of these cycles of rememberance and forgetfulness -having cultivated deeper degrees of faith in the underlying current of truth that exists throughout it all…
“Even if i can not see truth at the moment, it is there supporting me.”
It is ideas and images like these that serve as lanterns that can reassure & support me in dark times of forgetfulness.
This blog represents my personal affirmation of the utility of these momentos -insights captured in the form of writing, art, curation & expression- as integral sources of support along my spiritual journey.
As such, i’ve come to see creative expression as a chance to embed windows unto the underlying dimension of truth within the medium of time & matter.
May the light from these windows illuminate for all.
