Why do Art and Meditation?

1. Reflecting on Self Discovery

Geri and I were using Insight Dialogue processes asking ourselves why we do art and why we do deep awareness meditation. Were there any meeting points?

Over the years I've seen different motivations driving why people do art and meditation. I'll reflect on some of them gradually in these blogs as they seem relevant to students' explorations and my own practice. I also hope they will become part of the Awakening Through Creativity book I'm working on right now.

One of the most meaningful reasons we found for doing art is that it helps us discover, reveal, make visible what is real but is visually invisible in the ordinary everyday life world. It points us to the timeless being, divine presence, awakened mind, whatever we want to name it depending on our use of language, culture, beliefs, non-beliefs and so on. It enables us to delve deeper than the purely verbal, opening us into the tactile, unconscious, supra-conscious dimensions of experience.

Interestingly, awareness meditation aims to help us get to know ourselves at all levels, including learning to rest in our innate, timeless essence.