I recently came across this eloquent post from John Tarrant a meditation teacher who was born in Tasmania:
“The first thing about really having your own creative life is not thinking you know what you are, not thinking what you are already thinking. This comes from making space, from not knowing, from playing.
We are living and making a work of art at the same time. The work of art is what we do, it’s also who we are. We ourselves are the work we are making.
Sometimes are just walking along and the world becomes real and beautiful. The bird calls, the face of a child, the lights in the rain, step forward. When we have difficulties we forget these moments of beauty but they are just as real as any difficulties we might have. Even the plain moments of life have infinite depth.
In Zen these glimpses are called turning moments because they turn us to face a new direction. And the poetry or koans that evoke such moments are called turning words.
And what do we discover? That we weren’t doing it wrong, that there is a happiness deep inside both the oldest and youngest things. Nothing is missing. Even when we think that the world has gone wrong, that thought has a light inside it, and expresses our unique life.
The turning moment is the creative moment, the time in which everything seems possible. The walls we have made fall down all at the same time.”
–John Tarrant
Leave a Reply