My friend Galen sent me this:

“Are there dangers in being ‘spiritual but not religious’?” http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/personal/06/03/spiritual.but.not.religious/index.html

Hmmm…sounds a little biased, but thought you might be interested

My reply:

Interesting… All things that have been said before. It only looks biased because it’s framed by the Jesuit priest’s comments. I think it sounds like his church-ego’s at stake :]

All these terms–religion, faith, spirituality, institution–have slippery definitions, but I could put it this way:

My “religious” values come from my high school, which is guided by the Episcopal church (also the church I grew up alongside). So my sense of relationship and obligation to community–the Jesuit’s proclaimed concerns–are tied to the institutions that I fell in with by chance during my formative years. But since I don’t believe that Jesus has the power to condemn or save my soul, those traditions can’t govern my spirituality. (And thus, I’m not supposed to call myself “Christian.”)

To me “spirituality” is the more mystical side of “religion.” My spirituality–my understanding of the connectedness of the universe, my sense of place in it, and my attention to my relationship with it–develops from what I feel, what I learn, and what makes sense to me. That stuff’s informed by my Episcopal background to some degree, but only as much as that tradition fits into the rest of my experience.

Since a mystical experience is by definition a -personal- experience with the divine, who cares if other people see it the same way? What’s important to society is the way people act. Although one might suppose that most religious people’s actions relate to their understandings of relationships with gods, really the only traceable and potentially controllable elements are the rulebooks (i.e. the Ten Commandments). But political laws are easier to agree on (when people aren’t mixing them up with salvation theology), and they take care of the same things…

p.s. to the Jesuit: If I stand by my little speech above, I do seem to give the Episcopal church partial credit for forming the more charitable of my values. True, but only partial credit; the man who inspired me in high school was the Headmaster, not the Chaplin… And although their values were identical, the ethos the Headmaster imparted to the school did not depend on the students’ faith in God. The power to guide youths and society, then, is in the hands of educators…

So there! If I seem to imply that organized religion is universally unnecessary or obsolete, that is not my intent. I merely argue against the Jesuit priest’s suggestion that a genuine religious and spiritual life requires it…

It’s Easter Break. I’m not going home–not going anywhere. I keep calling it “spring break” because it really doesn’t mean anything to me. It’s quite beautiful outside–a softer heat than yesterday, a sort of hazy ephemeral humidity–and I’m sitting in the 24-hour room of the library with two other art majors and two random unfortunates, listening to Simon & Garfunkel, and posting.

I had two or three highly tangible dreams last night. In the only one I remember, I went back to the Aegean Center. We were a class of only 12-15, and Marilyn, Morgan, and maybe Lydia and Lindsay were there too. The island was very still when we arrived–under a haze like the one outside now, but cooler and bluer? Initially I seemed sort of devoid of sensory perception and emotion, but when the school buildings appeared around a corner, I felt this huge wave of unrealized grief mixed with love, reunion, and gratitude… I think I started to cry.

The rest is quotidian, so I won’t relate. But when I woke up this morning, I felt strange. Don’t really know how to explain it, but sort of like a little glimmer of light flickered through an expanse of smog…but I was still choked in smog (haay, SoCal summer)… Anyway, I walked to the Home Economist to grab lunch on my way to the library, and I still sensed a hint of that light. A sense of a goal? Direction? Am I inspired?

The point: in rather supressed and convoluted way, I’m feeling good. Hopeful. And I have two new painting ideas: a square color field in sage (light green+silver+blue+turqoise, muted and opalescent), and a narrow vertical portrait of the Aegean Center, Parikia. Nothing earth-shaking, but with warm feelings.

I’ll try to post photos or something later?

“Form is emptiness; Emptiness is form”
—The Heart Sutra, c. 100 CE

I’m told that if you study the Heart Sutra and contemplate its teachings appropriately, you’ll naturally conclude that the true meaning of that quotation is that emptiness is the nature of everything. Sure, very Buddhist. I maintain, however, that if allowed to stand on its own, the aforementioned quotation equalizes form and emptiness: if emptiness is the nature of all things, form is also the nature of all things–unconditionally and subject to no hierarchy. The labels at 12 and 6:00 on the notecard could be changed to “form” with no problem. This kind of relates to my personal project in art classes this semester…

I set out to expose a layperson’s self-consciously subjective perception of Ātman (the true self–the same essence as the universal reality, Brahman) within small natural objects: a variety of shells; a pine cone. A lofty goal, for sure. I’m unqualified to say whether or not it’s working, but here are some “stage” shots of what’s been happening in Adv. Painting:

Shell 1 (48″x30″):

Interesting tidbit: If you set that painting upside-down, next to Galen’s sexual squid, it looks remarkably phallic. :] Generally speaking though, I think my paintings look more vaginal… I’d hope so. I am a woman, and I don’t have penis envy. But I digress.

Shell 2 (60″x36″):

They’ve each evolved as much again since the last photo, but you’ve got a sense of it.

My goals generally include a limited palette, something along the lines of ambiguous simplicity or clarity, and space. I generally achieve the opposites. I think this says something about my process. But I think I’ve achieved some ambiguity between space and form? (That binary seems easier to grapple with than “emptiness and form.”) So I’m doing OK…

I’ve been feeling severely artistically blocked, actually. But never fear! Look what happened today:

Those are much smaller, and I have no idea what I’m doing. It’s interesting that Galen sees the macroscopic (?) when I try for the cosmos. Early Renaissance: macroscopic/microscopic expresses divinity… Nonetheless, I think for my next piece, I need to go big. And loosen up a bit.

So yeah… A mental map please? I got lost.

:o)

sitting on my pillow on my bed (lower back against that polar bear)–dusty blue onsie rolled down to shorts, “Tropic Sun” (Paros, Greece) t-shirt from Polos, three rings, beat-up nail polish, Peru string bracelet, and a really stupid up-do with a claw clip & paint brush–pomegranate wine in a Summit mug, green tea-infused pomegranate juice in Hannah’s purple thermos–and “Dreams” by the Cranberries, courtesy of Joy’s Art Major mix (yellow/blue).

it is nice.

I love…

sociable nights in the studio
Summit Coffee
a successful drawing
Balanchine
wine at tea time
flowers in beer bottles
that in-between degree, when the air’s still nippy but the sun feels warm
books borrowed from friends (especially unexpectedly)
my view of main street
season-appropriate bad music
quiet and the illusion of serenity

* * *

Easter’s coming this weekend. I’m a little sad that I don’t have a family gathering to be drawn to, and that I didn’t find a ride to SAS (which would have meant at least the same)… but I’m not thinking of this weekend as Easter, really. I’m calling it Spring Break. The real Spring Break was fine, but it didn’t feel much like spring; California rarely does, in my jaded experience.

Here are my goals for Spring Break:

- produce two kick-ass drawings
- develop a direction for a handful of business cards (small drawings)
- make a new woodcut, print it
- print the little sample woodcut
- start another mezzotint
- sort out my harddrives
- upload music from Matt, James, and Jean
- considering small woodcut, music, etc — assemble care packages!
- visit a new place with Matt
- go on that “adventure” with Matt
- maybe go to Linville Gorge when Matt and Brian go climbing, climb a little if they humor me, sketch, paint, read
- email people long-lost lovers (JZ, JC, SJK)
- take care of my camera!
- make that thing for R
- eat good food
- relax deliberately.

I think about Mr. Roach and Mr. McGiff a lot when I’m trying to pull myself together, get inspired, regroup, reorganize, recycle (har har), etc…. So perhaps I’ll write them letters, too.

Je suis prest!