"Held"

There is a story here... this is an intermediate image.  The image comes from a previous collage, again, I am doing lens close... blowing up a part of the image that called to me.  It is content from the unconscious mostly, it could be called a demon, in the sense that I have struggled with this little one.  As I began to sense into her, I knew that she is related to my birth trauma and the times I was ready to give up the struggle and collapsed.  Here are the tracings of that collapse, in someways a kind of death, a kind of freeze in the unborn child. The response of freeze that hunted rabbits have just before they are devoured by the lionness.  I took this image into the "feeding your demons practice".  This image being incredibly charged for me... I fed the demon the nector of me that it needed, to be held, to be washed, to have all of its weight supported in the holding so that it could relax and find deep trust, be refreshed and regenerated with the cool minty aspects of the nectar of essence... She, the child later transformed into a baby, and the baby as it became fully satiated with the nectar of healing transformed into a golden Buddha baby, an ally who will come when I call, when I visualize him he will be there to refresh me and fill me with trust. (The practice involved in this visualization comes from Tsultrim Allione's process of feeding your demons.  A powerful embodied process.)

Machig Labdrön

I have been mentioning, in some of my recent posts, the practice of "feeding your demons" as a transformative practice out of the Tibetan buddhist tradition, as taught by Lama Tsultrim Allione. This practice is derived from the Chöd practice developed by Machig Labdron, and exemplifed by a key story from her life: 

"While receiving an empowerment from Sonam Lama. In a state of profound samadhi, meditative absorption, Machig floats through the temple walls, out into the air, and finally up into a tree which stands at the edge of a lake belonging to a fierce naga king, or water spirit. Infuriated by her disrespect of his territory, the naga gathers an army of fierce and wild nagas who mount an attack on the naked girl sitting in total equanimity in the tree. Rather than fleeing or attacking, Machig instead turns and offers her body as food to the nagas. Stunned, the nagas vow their allegiance and eternal protection to Machig. This is a seminal story of feeding rather than fighting, the underlying paradigm of Feeding your Demons."

For more about Machig Labdrön's life https://www.taramandala.org/introduction/our-lineage/who-is-machig-labdron/

Machig Labdrön by Karma Yeshe 

Life Rising

 

Shamelessly...

 

Shamelessly


orange like a


parrot's beak,


arousing with a lover's


touch the clustered


lotus buds,


I praise this


great wheel the sun --


rising it is an


earring for


the Lady of the East.

-- Vidya Kara
11th Century Sanskrit Poetess


Durga Flower of Life

 

"Durga Flower of Life"

Today's image.  Again, I have gone in "lens close" to one part of my previous collage that I wanted to explore further.  The image of Durga at the center of the sphere above in the previous collage has now expanded into a collage of her own.

In the previous collages, the two in which this disc in the sky appears, I felt that it was combination of feminine yin (moon) and masculine yang (sun) energies in the sky.  Though not all cultures  ascribe the same "gender" to sun and moon.

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There is a wonderful article about the history of the female sun here https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sun-goddess_b_884568 

Here is a taste of the article: 

"In archaic times, people perceived the sun, in its shining prime and glory, the giver of heat and light and life, to be the effulgent force of the female. A passionate aspect of the great mother, the versatile jill-of-all-trades who issues forth and supports whole life. She is the heaven Illuminating goddess, Amaterasu Omikame, in Japan, and the queen of heaven and Earth, Arinna, in Mesopotamia. She was Yhi, sun woman, to the Arunta of Australia. Sun sister was known in Anatolia, Siberia and Native America.

Tribal North Europe knew her, too. The Germans called her Sunna, as did the Norwegians. In Scandinavia, she was Glory-of-Elves or Sol. The Eddas say that on doomsday, she will bear a daughter who will be the new sun, the next creation. The luminous world to come. She was Sol, as well, to the Celts who also called her Sul or Sulis. Her celebrations took place on open plains, on hilltops, overlooking springs. A major ceremonial site was Silbury Hill (Sulisbury Hill) and the springs at Bath, once called Aquae Sulis, were the site of Roman altars sacred to Sul Minerva.

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So coming back to today's image... As you may know, Durga appeared to me first several months ago in a dream.  I knew nothing much about Durga other than that she was a powerful Hindu goddess.  I explored and found a wonderful retelling of her story on youtube basically describing how when the gods Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu were at their witts end and about to lose the great battle against the most terrible demons of the universe, they remembered that the feminine principal was missing, and they went back to the most elemental forces of creation to bring forth Durga who was not yet manifest. She had all of their powers and then some. For her defeating the demons was nothing.  Her weapons were sure, precise, and she was radiantly relaxed and at ease in her heart, every demon that went banished deepened her state of radiant love, grace and ease.  (Interestingly this telling of the story based or flowering out of essential peace and love has an interesting resemblance to the story told by Tsultrim Allione, described as a practice begun by a woman in the 11th century by the name of Machig Labdron. This practice also figured in a recent dream.). Since the dream in which Durga appeared, I have made 3 previous images, this is the fourth.

In the qigong practice I have taken up, she is one of my "masters" (think ally, think teacher...)

This is a loving and flowering ever-present Durga, synonymous with life force.  She is very much like some of the ancient mythic manifestations of the Sun, solar, life-giving, but really more like the force behind the the manifestation of the sun.

There is a cosmic dimension to Hindu mythology that I love... the cosmos is here, the love and intelligence manifest in all creation is here in the form of the Flower of Life.

It is also a story of the flowering of the heart of durga.  She is spherical as well, like the circles making up the flower of life, the sphere of wholeness, a building "block" of creation that is omnipresent through the whole field going back to before the beginning of creation, the space out of which everything emanates.

In each of her infinite hands she holds a rose.  A gift, an opportunity, a teaching, a treasure ever-present in life, whatever the challenges are... Durga is capable of handling the greatest of demons with ease.

At the very center of the golden flower of her heart, is a single dew drop.  From the macro to the micro she is there.  Here on earth life arose and continues to arise out of water.

The collage practice continues unfolding... revealing... showing and telling... (This is part of my larger series Embodied Psyche: A body in progress.)

Healing Universe

 

This is the lastest collage.  It is called "Healing Universe"... I have been having symbolically potent dreams that seem to be arising from my recent qigong practice and the Lama Tsultrim Allione "feeding your demons" work, a powerful approach for transforming any inner demons you may battle with!

This image is directly based on my experience of a visualization that activates interoception, qi and imagination in powerful healing ways. It comes out of the  qigong as taught by Master Chunyi Lin. Just briefly, this is the structure: You dedicate the practice at the beginning to your "masters", these are your teachers, your divine guides, universal love, god/dess, however you want to define it, they are sources of guidance and wisdom for you.  Then you set an intention, then you do the breathing. As you breathe in, you breathe in the energy, life force that is all around us in the universe through all of your cells, this feeds all of your cells and adds to your life force vitality stored in the lower dantien, behind the belly button. As you breathe out, you imagine any energy blockages that you feel anywhere in your body are dissolved into smoke or transformed into butterflies that fly out into the furtherest reaches of the universe as "excess energy" that is now free.  

From a creative "technical" level what I have done here is that I have taken an aspect of a previous collage "bombs falling" that I wanted to explore and develop further.  This is a type of revisting or recycling to deepen into material that speaks to you. It is an aspect of the crystalization process. (The image also incorporates the divine energy of the goddess Ma Durga, also the subject of several previous collages.)

As I made the collage, I felt into my experience of this qigong practice... the movement and freeing of energies, the receiving vital nourishment at a cellular level... I am beginning to get new insights and experiences, understandings about qi, the life force energy in everything. These lessons were already coming from nature— But since much of this practice come from the Taoists, it makes sense that it is so resonant for me. 

Time to feed the demons

 

 

"Time to feed the demons".  

This image arose from a meditation practice I did online with a youtube video recorded by Lama Tsultrim Allione who has written a book called feeding your demons that is based on the Tibetan Chod practice. It is important to understand that in this context our demons are not external, they are internal forces within our psyche.  In many cases people externalize and demonize people and things outside of themselves, these projections on to the outer world are harmful to self and others but it is the fuel of the polarization and discord that we see in the world.

For more about the practice as Lama Tsultrim teaches it: https://www.academia.edu/42410810/Feeding_Your_Demons_Tsultrim_Allione

I found the meditation practice extremely powerful. I came face to face and felt in an embodied way what in the Ridwhan School is know as the "pea", it is the inner core of the ego identify, and may be experienced a a kind of green snotty pea.  We all develop an ego as part of our developmental process, it is an important phase for getting by in the world. And yet, at the core it is false, it is a useful fiction when we create it, but it is not our real essential self, at some level we know this, and in order to grow personally and spiritually, at some point we need to face this.  (For more information on this concept you can visit https://www.diamondapproach.org/glossary/refinery_phrases/pea )

Part of the meditation is to fully see and embody your demon.  I was not planning for this to be the "demon" that arose, but it did, spontaneously.  As I felt into this "demon", I felt how my body shrank, cringed and got contorted and became like a snotty green pea, no way to sugar coat it.  Complete undesirable, completely unlovable.  The meditation, rather than to kill the "demon" (which in mythology usually results only the propagation of more demons or more heads to the demon) to direct love and compassion, to offer youreself with complete surrender to the demon and to find out what it needs. Immediatly I began to feel what a terrible predicament this demon is in!  It was intense and painful to embody and yet as I directly complete and unconditional love, the relationship of deep rejection and aversion changed and I could love this aspect of myself and feel such deep compassion for its predicament and pain.  As I did so everything softened.  The "false identity" did not feel threatened and so could soften, there was a sense of loving coexistence... I am certain this scene has been portrayed in many stories through the ages, and in many movies, where the monster or beast turns out to be an incredible ally.

Though this was tough going, the sense of this has remained with me. And I have returned to this again and again, sometimes entirely spontaneously.  And creating the image is a part of the practice of recognizing and loving the core of th ego, what is sometimes described as the core of the "false self"... but in fact, I don't find this terminology helpful.  What I do find helpful is the practice of embodiment, surrender and love.  Tsultrim Allione cautions that this is not perhaps the best practice for those who have not developed a sense of self or for children. And that the part of self-love may be practiced, but there is another step of dissolution, and that is should be used only for adults or those who have grown into "themselves" in the world. 

I am finding the practice of following the inner threads through images that appear from the soul through art to be a powerful practice.  A way of "tending the images" that Carl Jung and James Hillman speak to, and that the poet Rilke also speaks to... In the expressive arts we refer to this as decentering which refers to bringing these inner images and identifications into form through the arts so that they can been seen externally.  Externally they also become a "third" and there is a natural disidentification in which you can play with the relationship to the third, you can open up the range of play, you can transform the inner play or dance or painting you are in... 

A lot has been said in ancient times and modern times, but ultimately it is the practice of noticing and the lightness of playing that allow us to move from the soul and feel the communion with earth and cosmos. It is about the serious play of tending to life.

Quotes specifically to do with tending images:

"… I do want to suggest the peculiarity in an image. Images, you know, are very odd arrangements. They are heightened intensified moments.

All the events of an image occur together. Simultaneity contrasts with the sequential reading of narrative in which events follow one after the other." —Jame Hillman

"You must give birth to your images. They are the future waiting to be born. Fear not the strangeness you feel. The future must enter you long before it happens. Just wait for the birth, for the the hour of the new clarity." -Rainer Maria Rilke

Chaos and creation

 

As I lingered for a moment before getting out of bed, aware of the light awakening in the room with me, I felt the silkiest feeling of a gentle vibration through my whole body.  This full moon, I thought, has been a gentle one, a benevolent one.  Every inch of of the gentle weight of the covers on me seemed to be gently holding me. I knew it was dawn, the sky was calling me, I was wondering if I had missed the moment of the sun rising above the  horizon, above the mountains across the plateau.  As I walked out into the satiny air and looked out, the sun was not yet up... and a full silvery libra moon (called a pink moon this month) was lowering towards the horizon, sliding down the sky towards the Cerro de la Santa Cruz, where it would set... The sun getting ready to rise was transforming the horizing with a fuscia red glow.  There was perfect balance, the sun coming, the moon going... just as the sun rose, the moon set behind the hill.

So this image.  In this image I continue to work with the energies of chaos and creation that we are experiencing collectively.  The bombs are falling, there is destruction, there is the blood and tragedy of war, the fear of missiles, the dread, the grief, the gratitude that many of us feel that these are not falling on our home, yet the deep underlying feeling that yes, they are falling on our home, this is our planet, this is our only home. I am holding the contrasts, holding the vibration of healing, remembering Michael Meade's words "Creation is the only outcome of conflict that is satisfying to the human soul."  Holding the collective and personal opportunity for healing out of the chaos as we reach deeply, facing demons, discovering angels, working with the life force energy as we love this earth, as we also face the vulnerability of our own mortality while we recognize, as the master teacher Thich Nhat Han taught "a cloud never dies"— It only transforms... when we experience signlessness we understand this clearly. (I know I am taking a lot of liberty to speak with a collective "we" and it is really very personal for each of us, and yet there is a collective place we are together on this journey at this time we share on earth, each of us facing challenges of so many kinds— and again and again people who guide the way show us that it is all about love.

Just in the way the sun and the moon were in perfect balance on the east and western horizon's, so there is a dynamic tension in these times.  Chaos and creation.  It is not so different than an isometric contraction or "condensation" of two opposing muscles, the flexor and the extensors on both sides of a joint being activated at the same time, creating dynamic flow (what Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen sometimes calls postural flow).  This involves the whole body and arises from the feet in contact with the earth, with the womb, with the mother.  This is one of the gateways to being direct touch with the life energy and the space that created us, a move back to the moment of becoming embodied on this planet while still fresh and in touch with cellular flexibility, cellular flow, going back to the flow that creates and that is life...

Happy full moon!

This image celebrates this full moon in libra, on the birthday of Lord Hanuman, something I just discovered.  

Yet the work itself arose a from an image of a few nights ago in which I dreampt with an image of an egyptian elongated head... I cannot recall the details of the dream, there seems to have been more having to do with flow, fluity.  I think of the ancient sacred flow of the nile yet I know little about this river, symbolically it is so important to who we are, it nourished a whole civilization's development and continues to echo in our genome with the most interesting hamonic music and knowledge beyond what we can fathom but that points to dimensions of who we are ancestrally in a cosmic sense.  

Exploring some of the work of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen of Body-Mind Centering, I have been doing some somatic sensing into the birth process in which, if we have a normal birth with anterior presentation, the first part of the skull to connect with and be stimulated as it gets into position for birth is the posterior portion of the crown of the skull which is closely linked energetically or somatically to the the pineal gland... 

I had been doing the sensory sequence to feel the progression from the posterior area of the crown to the celestial crown, associated with mamilary bodies, on to the frontal area, associated with the pituitary gland... This can be done easily by gently cupping the posterior crown area and giving yourself a gentle massage, then moving to the celestrial crown at the center (the same area we may visualize as being the connection between our gravity line to the earth and the star we could imagine we are connected to through the forces of levity.)

I think it was this exploration that brought this image into my dream, as I was integrating the somatic sense of it and the kind of consciousness I felt awakening... It was Bonnie Bainbridge who mentioned that this pineal area was the area elongated on the Egyptian royal babies... Intuitively I believe that it was perhaps to sensitize the mystically understood pineal functions more? 

There is more here from the somatic practice. The full moon rising at the base of the skull has to do with new sensory information entering through the back of the brain, through the brainstem really—this is a pathway for the brain gets new information that can be integrated from the bodies experience bypasing the controlling exectutive function, whose recorded patterns, in cases of injury may no longer be effective... or simply to begin the expand our own sense and experience of what is possible, of what we can embody, perceive, live...  So in a sense there is a prayer, an opening a call present in the image for this full moon to bring in greater understanding, new information from the cosmos.  This is in fact the way the brain originally laid down its patterns of understanding, from the direct experience.

Bombs falling

"Creation is the only outcome of conflict that is satisfying to the human soul. The good news is we are in a creative process, the bad nes is that we need to tolerate a lot of tension, confusion and even chaos before we can get to what is trying to be created in the world at this time." —Michael Meade (Living Myth Podcast #275)

Continuing on the theme of shadow-demon images... This is the next image of my series... I feel that is some ways these collages are less aesthetically developed, it is more of a low skill, high sensitivity type of express... important to things that are coming up in my psyche and that I am trying to understand, to learn from.  

This image has its seed in a dream, almost nightmare where there are bombs dropping from the sky and there are other hi-tech flying machines in the air.  The feeling is of fear, and of dread, of wanting to hide, of not fully comprehending how this can be happening, I think my inner child wanting safety, i.e. to roll up in a ball, maybe an aspect of the freeze survival instinct of shutting down... other aspects look up or out of the house with different emotions...  I have combined these challenge demon-shadow issues through the art process with resources or healing, with the "opposite" on the right side, and there is a middle ground in which there is hope of some communication, permeation of wisdom and information between the realms. It feels very much like a collective unconscious dream too, as we share the horror of unfolding war...  (I have inserted a little bit of humor in it all as well... lest we get so fixated we hurt ourselves and our ability to be resilient and help one another...)

 

Sustaining connection to soul

“It’s very hard to sustain the connection to the deep self or the soul without a practice. Just counting on accident, it doesn’t happen that way.  The two big paths of practice typically are meditation and contemplation as one path, and the other is the creative arts. In the modern world the creative arts are not always seen as practices… they are seen as industries which shows you how far things have fallen. In is an inner contemplation, meditation, and the other is a move out into the world on the energy of creation. The contemplative style of practice is often associated with spiritual things, but the creative arts were also spiritual expressions. The spirit of life coming through people in order to put things of beauty and of meaning in the world. So they are all spiritual paths.  Originally all of the arts were in service of the divine… You back and look at the art of the world and it goes closer and closer back to divine things. So those are the two paths… some people are drawn to both”. —Michael Meade

Light & Shadow

 

I am so interested in the relationship that is developing, the rhythm that is being revealed in my psyche between light and dark, between illumination and shadow, between the angels of light and the voice of the "demon" (denser more unconscious presences) and how this becomes a dialogue, to look at one is to look at the other, they each reveal the other.  I am learning or finding not to dread the "shadow" figures, rather they are showing me something... they often turn up after illuminating experiences, where it seems light and shadow are both revealed (angel and demon realms).  

Demon for me represents the part of the personal and the collective unconscious that take us into cycles of suffering, whereas the angelic and dakini presences are those that awaken us, liberate us, reveal the awakened mind.  That said, I have had two dark shadow dreams recently, or at least dreams in which the shadow played a strong protagonic role, for which I have made images... 

This is the most recent image, and it come after so many ah-ha luminous moments that in fact now I celebrate its appearence, actually it is entitled "Light and shadow, though the dream ended on the shadow note.    

I am also attaching the previous one because they are related.  They are both speaking to the pressure to conform.  This you could say is my current demon, meaning that it is what is becoming conscious.  What are the ways in which I have interalized the pressure to conform (the older image from March), and some of the societal, collective pressures to conform (more of today's image)... The pressure is subtle and it feels so linked to survival tactics/circuitry... I will spend some more time later in contempation of these images... but this is just first flush sort of ah-ha... so interesting... the pressure to conform and how that encumbers our life force... there seems to be something in here about patriarchy too... as there are prominent male figures (see the poor guy forced to sew on a new face, trying to look casual, with the tie/leash around his neck, societal agents breathing down his neck ensuring he conforms)... the ones that need to go out into the world and survive (at least on a developmental archetypal level...).  

The new image is called at least for now "Light & Shadow"... (It is also interesting that I have been actively preparing for a trip to the States after an absence of quite a while. I am also fascinated by how the meaning of both transcendent experiences of lightness and dreams perhaps with heavier emotions, can become so transparent to themselves in the process. of art making... meaning making, making sense of things literally in the "making", in the "poeisis"...)

"Interbeing"