The Artist's Way - The Blue Iris Garden

“The true use of art is, first, to cultivate the artist’s own spiritual nature.” – George Inness

I have been participating in a Zoom workshop based on the book I read several years ago titled the Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity.  This workshop and recent changes in our world and my life has allowed me to focus on a new website and blog on WordPress that I am designing titled The Blue Iris Garden – Finding God in All Things.  The Blue Iris Garden is a platform where I will share my thoughts, teach and lead on God and higher consciousness, gardening and nature, art, and creativity to open our thinking, see possibilities to make constructive changes within our lives knowing that each of us affects the whole. 

 

The Artist’s Way which is based on God as the unlimited source of creativity with the power of flow that opens doors as we need them providing opportunities in our life.  It is very different than the corporate structural model I used to audit that sets objectives and constructs processes and controls to obtain them.  As I thought about my new journey, I wondered, are they two separate approaches to life or can or should they be combined?  Should and can I completely let go of one in order to achieve the other?  When I worked for the Jesuits, I was taught contemplative prayer (which requires emptying our mind and allowing direction to emerge), action (taken on the direction received in prayer), and reflection (evaluating our thoughts and results before prayer) which is a form of practicing the Artist’s Way.

 

But I know based on psychology classes that switching our minds between the Artist’s Way and a structured repetitive thought process is very inefficient and draining for the brain.  I realized that I do have to work primarily within the Artist Way and use structured thinking on a limited basis by beginning with the end in mind.  I have learned the importance of habits, routines, and scheduling blocks of time for dreaming, reading, thinking, writing, exercising, and completing tasks.  And I believe everyone needs a space that inspires them while they create especially for me because I not only write, but I am a visual artist.  

 

And I step back further and think about our Earth with billions of people connecting within societies acting in collectives, I ask how do we change given we have brought our existence to the edge of extinction with unsustainable populations and consumption, mass weapons and environmental destruction?  I realize that the answer is to raise our consciousness and focus on making incremental changes that impact the end while networking our ideas.  We need to make our changes locally, within a larger picture and vision of what we want to be universality while honoring the diversity of our cultures and environments.  And we recognize that each of us is uniquely gifted to serve differently. With faith, love, and hope knowing our creator is all powerful and his creation is miraculous we change the world spreading joy and kindness while holding ourselves accountable.  

 

As I thought, I realized that over my lifetime and especially within the last year, how much uncertainty I have been able to accept without stress has changed.  I can move between abstract questions and the big picture and the detail.  I can focus on the moment and what is immediate, while keeping the end in mind.  When I was younger, I was so busy and task focused, I didn’t think about the larger picture and consequences or trust my intuition and feelings about the choices I was making.  But now with the virus, climate change, political climate and social unrest I am far more conscious of the impact of my decisions and the need for individual and collective change.   With age, I am now aware of a universal consciousness that the Bible and spiritualists have been experiencing and writing about since humans were created.  I am aware that my individual thoughts and actions not only change my behaviors, but impact others' thoughts and behaviors.  I also know our collective thoughts and actions create a consciousness and spiritual energy that affects our mental, emotional and physical wellbeing  without being experienced through our five senses.  And I know the importance of the physical restoration of gardening and nature on Earth is required for our physical, mental, and emotional health because all of nature is part of the universal consciousness created through God as well as experienced through our five senses.

 

I realize that I need to lead through helping others visualize, be creative and step out to make a collective vision that is beautiful and intricate.   I will always love my personal exploration of God, higher consciousness and communication in Sacred Souls over the last seven years, but it is time to write, teach classes and network in my life and my new website and blog.

 

I hope you will join me in The Blue Iris Garden - Finding God in All Things as I begin my new journey on the first day of Spring, March 20th.    

 

 

 

 

Everything is a Miracle

“There are two ways to live your life.  One is as though nothing is a miracle.  The other as though everything is a miracle.”  Albert Einstein

This morning as the clouds cleared and sun streamed through the windows with still bitter cold and untouched white snow on the ground in my backyard, I sat with my coffee and looked at my yellow, blue and floral pillows glowing on my sofa I found myself in deep thought.  The first is that I am so incredibly blessed in my warm beautiful home with people and animals suffering and dying due to the frigid temperatures.  And I thought about all the problems in the world we are facing and that that those problems seem so insurmountable and outside our control.   My thoughts then wandered to last week when one of the men in my Christ based discussion group shared a book on faith he was reading.  As he talked, I realized he was discussing intellectual scientific and faith-based arguments on what is a miracle.  I felt the need to laugh because one of my favorite quotes from Albert Einstein suddenly came to mind.  He said, “There are two ways to live your life.  One is as though nothing is a miracle.  The other as though everything is a miracle.”  Everything is miraculous if you see and experience life through that lens, but the reality is a large percentage of our world is not because they are focused on surviving the next crisis including not freezing to death or baking in temperatures over 100 degrees.   And I realized the hypocrisy of even writing this blog entry when I live as I do safe in my beautiful home.  But I kept thinking….

Yesterday, I was listening to Bill Gates talk about global warming and he pointed out that a large portion of greenhouse gases are emitted by agriculture including cows.  And then I thought about the series on Magnolia network, the Lost Table where a small rural town restaurant in Freedom, Maine supports farmers who raise livestock, vegetables, fruit, and seafood in the area and how beautiful and amazing that life is, although not easy.  And then my mind flipped back to Bill Gates in his intellectual mode was talking about companies need to produce beef in the lab which is humane and how that was the future of mass produced beef.  Many Americans who regularly eat beef contributing to greenhouse emissions do not realize that other countries are replicating our diet with far reaching environment consequences.  And after reading the Fate of Food by Amanda Little, I know that feeding the growing world population in a warming climate has become a crisis that needs to be met with a variety of solutions, including choosing to eat less meat and grow meat in labs.  But underlying it all is that we have reached a world population number long ago that is not environmentally sustainable, and we need to recognize that fact in developing our solutions.  Do we want a world where communities like Freedom Maine cease to exist because we are developing technical solutions for a population that cannot be sustained by our Earth home given the way we want to live?  Is building electric cars and infrastructure using precious earth resources while we lack the systems to effectively recycle or reuse wise?  At what time in civilized world history do we run out of nonrenewable resources that we are consuming?   How do we reduce our world population to a sustainable level, without accepting mass deaths due to climate change and other causes?  It is a conscious decision, but one we can make.  We can choose differently, but we need to act individually and as a group in making our decisions and deciding what to sacrifice while developing innovative solutions.

And then I come back to my faith in God and my belief that everything is miraculous.  I thought about my Christian friend who spends time praying for miracles to extend the life and ease the suffering of his friends and family, while hoping to be accepted into heaven.  And I asked myself, is prayer without action enough?  I thought about the Christians who believe Jesus is going to come back and save the world they believe is unredeemable.  But in the Gospels Jesus said the kingdom is here and never promised to come back and save us in this existence.  Jesus’ point is that we are saved, but we need to live like it.

God is in the moment.  God is love.  We live in this amazing world and universe which is miraculous and proof of miracles to come.   We are on an eternal journey that does not end within this existence but requires us to make decisions to care for each other.. And we should find joy, chose differently, and have faith that with God and each other we can care for our Earth home.  The end is not certain because there is always faith, love, and hope.  Everything is a miracle.

   

A Winnie the Pooh Day

“What day is it?” asked Pooh.

“It’s today.” squeaked Piglet.

“My favorite day.” said Pooh.

 

Today was a sunny day and I set off for my three-mile walk around the neighborhood to clear the cobwebs and heaviness from my mind from our recent cloudy days at the end of January. As I walked clarity returned, and I thought about my Facebook post from Winnie and the Pooh about the simple joy of focusing on the moment.  And I agreed with Pooh, today is my favorite day.

As I sat down to write this, my cat Chloe is licking the remaining drops of potato soup from my lunch cup.  She really shouldn’t be in my cup, but I decided to let her have her moment. And several minutes after she finished, she is still flicking her tongue savoring the taste of each drop.  She then proceeded to clean her paws thoroughly while sitting on the desk in front of me.  And in the background on my favorite playlist Ed Sheeran is singing Perfect Symphony with Andrea Bocelli.  And as I listen, Chloe looks at me in adoration.

 

Let us remember to gaze at our loved ones in each perfect moment..