Painting Paragraphs With Words

In a book titled: “The ten Oxherding Pictures; A Guide to Enlightenment,” by a Professor of Jungian Psychology and Philosophy, he writes about Zen and the art of seeing: “Seeing is one of the things Fredrick Frank teaches in his ‘Zen of Seeing/Drawing’ workshops.”  He says we do a lot of looking, we look through glasses, we look through telescopes, we look through camera lenses but, there are very few of us have learned what it is to really see.

In the book, it says, a Zen Master once said:  “The meaning of life is to see;”  though we spend a lot of time looking, there is very little that we actually see — in reality, perspective is limited to experience….  At the same time, experience is only limited by our perspective, sensation and perception and yet, that’s the beauty of it.  When you look: what you see; and, how you see it.

Someone I know once described how they paint everything they see as they are seeing it.  Imagine; it is difficult to express that what you cannot see, in the same way it is hard to understand that which you do not know….

“The first half of life is spent learning, the second half of life is spent understanding.” ~C.G. Jung 

If to look is to learn and, to watch is, to observe, as to see is, to know and, to seek is, to understand, then, looking is to seeing as, watching is to seeking and, learning is to observing as, knowing is to understanding.  Knowing is understanding, if and only if, one is learning to see and, seeking to observe.  In other words, seeking is a kind of knowing with respect to understanding how to see with your ears, feel, and, listen with your eyes.

Imagine; if you can write, so to you can paint.  Painting is as to a piece worth one–thousand words.  Each note, each word, is like a brushstroke in a composition.  Painting paragraphs with words, is as to all the little details that inevitably make up the bigger picture in the end.  A picture can speak a thousand words—and yet to two artists, it can only mean one thing.

However, it is, still, a developmental process, one in which a series of small seemingly insignificant simple strokes begin to come together and evolve to express something more highly complex….

Though, in Buddhist Philosophy:  “Nothing that is, arises from itself;”  So then, “Dream.”

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This article inspired by The Moth: Story Core; please, subscribe—and now, “Good Karma,” by Jack Hannibal….  http://themoth.org/posts/stories/good-karma