You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
— Wild Geese by Mary Oliver —

This morning I was reflecting on the meaning of Santa Claus in my life. Then I looked at one of our curtains in the bedroom, and I saw this. Can you see Santa there?

This morning I was prompted to find this book. I read it years ago. It often turns out that when I follow these impulses the book is just what I need right now.

I intend to read it and study it again. On initial perusal, these words came from somewhere inside of me: “Sinking down into who I really am.”

This morning I stepped onto the back deck for my nature meditation. The sunlight was dappled on the trunk of the burgeoning crabapple tree. Its canopy was alive with the fluttering of nuthatches, chickadees, and robins. I could hear robins singing close by. The sky held the intense blue of fall, a backdrop for the green crabapple leaves and birch leaves turning golden. The air was crisp but not too cold on my skin. The scene drew me into its embrace,  the embrace of continuous, unbroken awareness– open-eyed meditation.

Nature has become, for me, the gateway to continuous, unbroken awareness. As I remain aware of my breathing in this setting, I feel I am “entering the Void with the eyes open.”***

*** Entering the void with the eyes open is what I call “open-eyed meditation.” The mind becomes increasingly silent and awareness of oneself and the object of perception sharpen and merge. “Mahasunya, the Great Void, is a transcendent state in which the subject has merged with the object.” (The Doctrine of Vibration, Mark S.G. Dyczkowski). “All of creation, and the vibrational sounds associated with it, exist in the vast silence of mahasunya, the Great Void. It is from this silence that they will emerge into boisterous activity.” (The Splendor of Recognition, Swami Shantananda)

The foundation of my artwork is engagement in practices that cultivate inner awareness. I then create art through and as sacred ritual. The artwork created subsequently becomes the basis for further meditation.

Each of us is put here in this time and this place
to personally decide the future of humankind.
Did you think the Creator would create unnecessary
people in a time of such terrible danger?
Know that you yourself are
essential to this World.

— Chief Arvol Looking Horse of the
Lakota,Dakota and Nakota Nation,
19th Generation Keeper of the
Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe

This morning I took a look at my birch forest spirit art piece. I have been meditating on the spirit of the forest in the mornings. As I looked at the drawing, I found it much easier to meditate on the spirit of the forest. New depths of connection and meaning were revealed to me as I meditated on the piece.

What I understand now is that when an artwork is created through sacred ritual, as this piece was, it can become an object of meditation.

This makes the description of what I do– sacred ritual artist– come even more to life.

I have produced a set of meditation cards with photos of nature. I have loved the process. This is truly what I love to do.

When we create art through sacred ritual, it becomes the basis for meditation.

Become subtle enough
To hear a tree breathe.

Just because it’s unseen doesn’t mean it’s unreal.