Categories Menu

A Playful Way out of a Rut

Every morning after I journal and before I meditate I read a sacred text. This morning I pulled from my bookcase a text that is sacred in its own way. It is a thin book written in 1960 by the writer Henry Miller entitled To Paint is to Love Again. “To paint is to love again. It’s only when we look with eyes of love that we see as the painter sees. He is in a love, moreover, which is free of possessiveness. What the painter sees he is duty bound to share. Usually he makes us see and feel what ordinarily we ignore or are immune to. It’s manner of approaching what the world tells us, in effect that nothing is vile or hideous, nothing is stale, flat and unpalatable unless it be our own power of vision. To see is not merely to look. One must look-see. See into and around.” Miller wrote as his profession and when he got stuck, he’d paint. Painting, though, wasn’t just...

Read More

New art at Starbucks changes store experience

      Today when I entered the Starbucks on 16th and Bethany Home, something was different.  I felt it. Looking around, I spotted walls filled with powerful art.  Art in which the space felt different, a bit cozier, like a living room.  Thanking the manager for the intimate feeling in the store due to this beautiful art, I was shocked to learn the 7th grade class at Madison 1 School were the Picassos.  Each piece had the name of the artist beneath it as though it were being displayed at the Phoenix Art Museum.  It is moments like this I feel a sense of pride in the human experience. I will never know what it means to the young budding artist to have their work displayed in their community. Does this one simple act translate into personal validation? Will these creatives know that what they generated from insides themselves is worthy of being framed and on display?  Will they be encouraged to create more?  Will they honor their...

Read More

Art as a Form of Forgiveness

In the midst of it all she chose color I sat listening attentively, taking in the message of the room when the speaker read a poem she’d written celebrating her daughter’s pink hair.  At first I felt a gulp in my throat followed by shallow breathing.  With my stomach in knots and my heart aching, guilt began rising.  I witnessed contrast.  Where this loving mother had celebrated the bright colors of her daughter’s hair, I had criticized mine.  Yes, my daughter also was one of the many with bold hair choices in her teen years.  Beginning with her natural soft brown mane, she became pink, dark blue, and midnight black.  My response?  Not poetry and celebration.  Criticism and shame.  I was afraid of how she would be perceived by others and instead of my bold lead in beginning the love train, I felt a need to prepare her for “out there” which really reflected “in here.”  I squandered an opportunity to love. Returning home I headed to my computer to write...

Read More