An existential crisis is the luxury afforded to those who have the space to reflect. At the moment I am taking that time.
As an artist and an artsworker there are opposing forces at work. There is the need to create art for the sake of creating it and thereby nurture the soul, the need to contribute different perspectives on issues of our times through the use of a creative voice and the need to make a living in a world that is not always kind to creativity.
These are all notions that arise from the mind.
Right now in this world my mind goes to purpose. What is my purpose? What can I contribute? How can I live with this creative mind and make sense of a world that seems to be imploding?
In Australia it is Spring and already the temperatures are soaring, we are gripped by a long drought and the once verdant rainforests are burning. Young people are being arrested as a threat to national security for protesting about the climate emergency, Aboriginal people are still being killed, refugees still languish imprisoned on remote islands by our government, women still battle the glass ceiling and domestic violence, our screens are filled with the facts, fictions and predictions of a world in decline and a dear friend just died at the hand of the bottle.
From my studio window the horizon is hazy with smoke.
I find it difficult to focus on one hand and struggle to let go and relax on the other. As an arts worker I find the incessant doing, the creative problem solving, the managing the left and right brain so that the creative voice of those I work with can be heard by those with a more left brain leaning exhausting beyond belief.
I saw this quote from Pearl S. Buck recently
"The truly creative mind in any field is no more than this: A human creature born abnormally, inhumanely sensitive. To them… a touch is a blow, a sound is a noise, a misfortune is a tragedy, a joy is an ecstasy, a friend is a lover, a lover is a god, and failure is death. Add to this cruelly delicate organism the overpowering necessity to create, create, create — so that without the creating of music or poetry or books or buildings or something of meaning, their very breath is cut off… They must create, must pour out creation. By some strange, unknown, inward urgency they are not really alive unless they are creating."
(quote courtesy of Johnathon Fields and the Good Life Project)
I get that.
I also get that by having an outlet for ones creativity and culture is good for the self; and recognise we are stronger together. That by working as a collective we raise the profile of the arts not just in our own suburb, our own town, our own region but collectively we contribute to a raised voice in our state, country and the world.
These are thoughts fuelled by an anxious mind. The “I“ of my voice an egoic construct.
How to hold all the pieces of the puzzle, how to step back, take a breath and see the forest for the trees. This is the question for these times.
A Tibet state of mind has clarity, is the reed in the river not the stone.