Building A Story Or Building A Studio

Beware of Low Hanging Prayer Flags

These days it's not so much what's going on in the studio but what's happening "to" the studio.  There is an old outbuilding on our property, the size of a small garage. Since we moved here it's been on my radar that it could be "my studio". One winter I dusted and swept and tried painting there. But the wood stove leaked as did the roof and the mixture of smells from smoke and mouldy chipboard  made me feel a bit woozy.  I grudgingly dragged things back to the house and tweaked the lighting in the basement a bit.

New Roof!

This year we hit the five year mark on our little island and we weren't sure if we were staying or going. You know how the mind grumbles, how it finds little things that pain it, how it likes to scan the horizon for problems. "This property is too much work.  It's dark. The ferry is too expensive. This is not right. That isn't quite the way I like it."  And on and on as the mind has a habit of doing, building it's case, sinking it's teeth into the juicy parts of aversion.  Jacob Liberman who has a wonderful TED talk here says we shouldn't call it thinking, we should call it worrying.  I might just call it "grumbling".

36"x36" each  that's big for me! and they quite accidentally go together!

And so I didn't "make a studio" in the old workshop building because I might not stay.  You know the kind of story, built on a teetering wall of doubt. You've probably done it a few times yourself, wrapping yourself in indecision because well, this is not right and that is a problem, and well, what if, and you just never know. So it's best not to commit. There's a snug comfort to doubt.

To make a familiar story short, sometimes you need to come to the edge of jumping into the brink to realize you want to stay where you are.  You start to really appreciate what you will soon lose: the grocery store clerk who says she hasn't seen you in a while, the stunning drive into town, the people that wave at you on your way by, the neighbours who organize the most idyllic summer evening of "boules". Suddenly you feel affection and amusement at the characters who used to seem, well, annoying. It strikes you as odd and you feel a lightness of being. You have the strange sensation of feeling at home in a place where you always had a back-up plan. You wonder if someone is putting something in the water.

Gutted

And then you start to clue into something, it's the movement of the mind.  Mostly we believe our stories, rather than question them. It's just easier. It's what we do.  We build the stories, we live in the stories, we are the stories. But sometimes, something in you calls you on your stories and you have the chance to say, HA.  And maybe you even tell yourself a different story, because you can (all the while knowing it's a story, that's the important part).

Blowing a hole in the old story and watching the wind whistle through frees up new energy.  Energy to build can replace the inertia of doubt. And so it's in progress, the building of a new studio.  Maybe it's just a story whose time has come. I don't know.

24"x24" Used To Be A Buddha

The carpenter ants (who knew?) have been sent on their way, the leaking roof replaced and the soggy press board removed.  We have an amazing carpenter (who is not an ant) who quietly, efficiently and with joy is rebuilding the place.  He says things like, "there's a solution for every problem." He's a dharma speaker without even knowing it.  When  the order for a new door gets delayed he says things like, "you never know what kind of day people are having."

 The new roof is on in time to keep out the fall rains and it's fun to watch the wizardry of the old becoming new.  It's always like that, the old becoming new, the new becoming old. Nothing stays the same for long. Doubt transforms into energy, energy into new things. And of course the stories, rising and falling with the movement of the mind. If only we can remember to hold them up and see them for what they are, strands of shadow and light illuminated by the movement of the mind.

Just Sitting

It would be very Zen to carefully replace each tube of paint and return each scrap of paper to where it belongs, lovingly and carefully as I worked.  But as you can see from this studio shot, that isn't my method.  I cook like this too.  Before you know it things are everywhere in a creative flurry.  And then when they reach some tipping point of chaos and disorder and  I can't bear it any longer or think straight, I pause to tidy.  Then I feel like a spritely little breeze has blown new energy into the place and  the process starts all over again.  As you can see Bunny, the cat, is exercising her supervisory prowess and disapproves immensely.

You might think I was going to write about the process of art but really I'm just out of art photos so this studio shot is standing in for a painting.  On the art front I am posting some paintings to the Boundless Gallery site this weekend so they should be available for viewing by Monday or so.  It was very gratifying yesterday when a buyer received the 3 paintings she had purchased and expressed her sheer delight to me.  That is the fun of selling directly, getting the feed back that reminds you of your initial intention.

I have been thinking about meditation today.  The Zen meditation that I am familiar with and have practiced for the last 4 years consists of sitting facing the wall with eyes slightly downcast, but open.  You are not thinking and not trying not to think.  You are just sitting.  Your aim is to be open and present.  You hear sounds, you observe your thoughts.  This is sometimes referred to as Shikantaza.  

Lately, after taking a set of qi gong classes I have been trying the method of meditation suggested in that class.  It is one that applies a concentrative focus on the hara or lower dan tien on the out breath.  It is used to build concentration, focus and ultimately chi.  I have actually found it really helpful to work with building focus and concentration, something that didn't really happen for me in the Soto Zen form.  But I have also noticed how the mind gets in there when there is a task to do, as in focusing on something specific (like the hara and chi building).  The mind wants to make this it's little project and once you do this you are on a slippery slope of watching and measuring and wanting things to go a certain way.  And then suddenly it's all gone awry.

This morning after we'd finished sitting my partner read me a little excerpt that expressed this perfectly, from a book he's been reading called "Meditation week by week" by David Fontana.  The quote was, "Whenever you intend that meditation should do something or reveal something, the conscious mind assumes it can do the work for you.  Meditation works best, if as soon as you sit on your cushion, all thoughts of goals and attainments are relinquished.  You sit in meditation simply because that is what you are doing."  He reminds us that we need self discipline to help us remain focused.  He talks about the pitfall of  "feeling elated" about anything that happens and I can always remember when I first started meditating and at some point in the meditation I'd feel "ah, it's finally getting going here, or this is going well", and poof it would be gone.  There is definitely a "no peeking" rule in meditation.  Once your mind gets in and starts stirring, everything falls out the hole in the bottom of the pot.

So in sitting meditation it is just the same as our practice out in the world.  It doesn't serve us to get attached to results, to have expectations, to think there is something to gain from our meditation.  We are just sitting there like little Buddhas.  As my friend the monk would say, "Buddha bows to buddha".

Studio Dharma

I spent a long time in my studio today painting. So much of what I observe and learn there amongst the paints and canvas and bits of paper is transferable to the rest of my life.  

Here is what I learned  today sitting in the organized chaos, wearing an old sweater that could scare the cat:

1.  The longer I spend working, the more work I realize there is to do.  That's very Dharmaesque don't you think?  The more training we do, the more we see what needs to be done.  Like training, painting is endless.  We are only limited by the amount of canvas available to us.

2.  Sometimes less is more.  Oh what a Zen cliche, but even a cliche can be true!  Knowing when to stop, to leave well enough alone, to be quiet, is a valuable asset in creating a work of art or life, especially seeing as your life is your biggest work of art!  I've ruined many a painting by continuing when I should have stopped.  Where else have I done this in my life, I wonder.  eek I'm afraid to look!

3.  It is much nicer to just spend time with your canvas and paints and your family and friends (or anyone really) than to constantly be looking at them sideways and holding them up to the light.  Do I like this eye, no, maybe that line is too dark, what about that shade of blue.   Too much checking in, mind chatter and judgement is not really helpful to any process.  It's better, but oh so difficult, to just be there, open and listening, letting your response come from somewhere deep inside whether your holding a paint brush or looking someone in the eyes.

4.  A happy, playful, attitude of exploration is the best approach.  You have more fun and will probably end up somewhere more interesting, than the grim and bear it school of life.  Some of the best end results come from happy accidents, whatever it is you're up to.  Things take on a life of their own when you step out of your own way, sometimes with results you never even dreamed of.

5.  Patience, patience, patience.  Maybe that painting will look different in the morning, just like that problem I've been stewing over, or the phone call I need to return, or the email that needs responding to.  Sometimes waiting and sleeping on things(as long as they're not too lumpy) is a miraculous transformer.  And maybe in the morning I wake up knowing just the colour or brush stroke to add here, or maybe it comes to me in the shower.  And maybe I just need to spend some time staring at that canvas (don't do this to friends, it makes them very uncomfortable!)

That's what I know for now.  I learned it from a paint stained table, a yogurt tub full of dirty brushes and boxes of scrap paper.  What secrets are lying around your humble abode???  Come on, share a few....