When driving along, glancing at the passenger sideview mirror that says: Objects in your mirror may be closer than they appear, my first response is anxiety, trying to work out what it means. If they may be closer, may they not be? Or may they be further? Or, if it may be nearer than it seems, how much nearer? I cannot even work out how near it seems. It reminds me of Bilbo Baggins, at his farewell birthday party, saying goodbye to all his friends and neighbors:

Alas, eleventy-one years is far too short a time to live among such excellent and admirable hobbits. [cheers abound.] I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.

– From Tolkein, The Fellowship of the Ring

Once Bilbo added the last sentence, there was dead silence from the crowd, as they tried to figure out if it was a compliment or an insult. Perhaps it has to do with my poor sense of spatial direction, but the information on the mirror confuses me in a similar fashion, as I have to try to understand what it means, which makes me anxious. Like Bilbo’s audience– I am unsure how to respond to the information I have been given.

This has prompted me to write about some remedies for anxiety, which is so pervasive in our world. Anxiety is contagious. It floats. It permeates. It is not grounded in any particular, but blossoms in the general. It is perpetuated by the endless lateral movements we make, responding to links, dings and news. It is fed by fear. Unless we do something specific to counter anxiety, we float in it through the day, and it enters our sleep at night.

Here are some ideas for stilling anxiety:

After writing the last post on sleep and dreams, with the poem by Herman Hesse*, Maria Poplova posted her Brain Pickings :

You were made to be yourselves. You were made to enrich
the world with a sound, a tone, a shadow. – Herman Hesse

For makers, and I think for most of us, there is a yearning to make a mark, leave a sign, sing, write, paint, proclaim– to leave a footprint .

What does it take for you to believe that your particular sound, tone, shadow is already in you, already good enough, and unlike anyone else’s? And that this has nothing to do with fame, acceptance or perfection?

These are questions I return to like water over stone. How often I forget Mary Oliver’s proclamation:

For how long will you continue to listen to those dark shouters,
caution and prudence?
Fall in! Fall in!

Yesterday I taught a class in brush lettering at the University of Louisville, to young students who don’t remember a time before social media…who feel the universal pressure of class assignments, and find it difficult to set aside time for what is going on inside. I was delighted to see how willingly they surrendered their phones to the “basket”, which was placed outside of our circle, away from our bodies and minds, allowing uninterrupted no ding-dong time to enter. They seemed to delight in the freedom of attending only to breath, brush and ink. (It’s just as well too, that I had no idea we would have an audience of students and teachers from the rest of the art department, as spectators. The students proved to be undaunted by this, completely willing to enter the temenos).

One of the great gratifications of teaching brush lettering is being witness to a student who suddenly comes alive, in body, mind and spirit, whose countenance is all at once lit up, by making of an unself-conscious, authentic, unedited mark. One unguarded moment of freedom from what anyone else thinks, including herself!

One door to finding yourself, and your path to enriching the world, is doing something that brings you pleasure. 

A phrase from our recent poem by Tony Hoagland comes to mind:

among your duties, pleasure
is a thing,
that also needs accomplishing
Do you remember?

Back in my studio, I took the time to find some things that give me pleasure, things that you can do even when you feel you don’t have enough time:

With Thanksgiving being so early this year, the holidays seem to have lasted longer. Yet how quickly another year arrives… One of my wishes for this new year is to pay more attention to night and dreams.

Our entire history is merely the history of the waking life of man; nobody has yet considered the history of his sleeping life. – Georg Christoph Lichtenberg c. 1780

Perhaps a contemporary exception to the idea that history is all about our waking life– that no one has revealed the history of their dreaming life– is Carl Jung’s The Red Book. It is noteworthy that he did not allow this amazing work, in which he writes and illustrates his dreams, to be published until 100 years after his death. The taboo of going into the dark was even stronger in the early 1900’s, especially as a professional. Carl Jung was a pivotal thinker in terms of bringing our focus back to night and dreams, in insisting that darkness, and our shadow self, our fears and our regrets, has a world of gold to offer.

I am just beginning my retreat at St Meinrad Archabbey, so instead of getting ready for the holidays, I am stealing time to contemplate classes for next year, paint and write. This is a long habit– taking time away in solitude while the world is occupied with decorating, shopping, and entertaining. Today the snow is falling. I am thinking of some quotes from books I am reading:

Don’t hurry. Don’t rest.
– Rachel Kadish, The Weight of Ink

in sorrow seek happiness. Work, work unceasingly.
– Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

It sounds harsh– the part about not resting, and working unceasingly– but there is something about not hurrying, having no interruptions, and working with my hands that expands the day.

Two new classes have been added for 2019:

I have been working on a new series of small paintings. Winter is a natural time to turn your gaze inward, and make space for what is to come. Painting and writing are ways to renew your dreaming life, to get fuel from the inner imagery that arises. The text in the paintings is written in one of my alphabets. Even when you feel as if “you got nothing”, begin with a color, a tool, an image, or scraps for a collage. It is a lovely way to balance the high pitch that tends to accompany the holidays.

This series is called Dream Image: Intuitive Messages

These works are on paper and mounted on 5” X 5” wood panels with a depth of 1” and 5/8”.

Here are a few of them available at my store: (click link for bigger images)

https://www.lauriedoctor.com/store/

Today we are going to explore what I am calling the third arrow, that magic number three that is the number of movement and creativity. The number that is in the old stories: three wishes, three sisters, three chances… Three creates movement– it breaks up the stasis or duality of two.

This is the third in our series of “arrows”- the first arrow being the necessary suffering of loss, impermanence and death. None of us, no matter how “lucky” we are, escape the first arrow. Last week we talked about the unnecessary suffering of complaint, blame and bitterness that arise from the second arrow.

To the Buddhist story of the two arrows, I have added a third. The third arrow does not inflict pain. It is about taking aim: pointing yourself in a certain direction. You do this by accepting what is presented and releasing the second arrow.

III. Third Arrow: Finding Direction

The question that the third arrow asks is:

What is the coherence that transcends chaos and impermanence?

This is the perennial question. It is behind the deep longing to be near, to feel continuity in the midst of chaos, and to leave a trace, a footprint, a song– it is what impels makers of all kinds to turn to praying with their hands.

Last week we addressed the first arrow, which is a symbol for the initial pain caused by loss, chaos and impermanence. The first arrow strikes each one of us at different moments along the way.

How do you respond to living in times of great change and difficulty? How do you find your footing when the world seems to be spinning out of control?

This is the second part of a three part series, based on a Buddhist story using arrows as a metaphor. Today I will talk about the second arrow.

II. The second arrow

How do you react when things fall apart?

The second arrow is more painful than the first one, because our minds torture us with reactions against the painful situation. We are beset with what ifs, and why this and why me. Whatever it is, we want it to stop or go away or be different. Our experience of the first arrow is compounded further by blame of oneself or someone or something else.

Our resistance to pain can take many forms, and often goes unnoticed. We become unaware of how aversion works against us. Or, when we do notice our fear, anger or impatience in response to a given situation, we berate ourselves for being imperfect, for being insecure, tired, angry or fearful. The second arrow becomes a flame of blame. This behavior is destructive, and blocks our movement toward the door that opens with pain.

In my recent travels west, I gave a talk on the urgency of artists to be a voice of meaning, the need to articulate something that creates a space, a place amidst the noise and crisis in our world. Everywhere I turn I see friends overwhelmed from the relentless news wheel; people sensing a change is gonna come, yet feeling helpless to act.

I promised I would post this talk, which I have divided into three parts, or three “arrows”. Today I am posting the first part:

Part I: The First Arrow

Especially in times of great difficulty, there is a desperate need for the stories from deep time, the timeless truths that have nothing to do with facts (which are always changing), or measurements, or any one religion, culture or race…

We begin with the idea that what is needed in times of trouble is a story– something that takes us outside ourselves and re-orients our internal compass.

The creation stories around the world, which reflect the pattern of all makers, begin in darkness or void or chaos. And there was darkness upon the face of the deep. Or, as Richard Powers says in the first line of his novel, The Overstory: 

First there was nothing. Then there was everything.

Places have resonance, defined as the quality in a sound of being deep. Find out about classes in the states, and abroad in Italy, Switzerland and Germany.... And every year I return to Taos, New Mexico in March and June... Also, beginning in 2020, is the first advanced calligraphy retreat at St Meinrad Archabbey. In 2021, a lovely retreat in the Blue Mountains of Australia…..

I’d love to hear from you.