Thursday, December 4, 2014

Authentic Beauty in Self- and World-Creation


         “Any work of art that deepens our understanding of anguish, moves us to relax the constrictions of self-centered craving, reveals the dynamic play of emptiness and form, and inspires a way of life conducive to such ends bears the hallmarks of authentic beauty. …
         The same aesthetic vision inspires the imaginative tasks of self- and world-creation. The ennobling truths are not just challenges to act with wisdom and compassion but challenges to act with creativity and aesthetic awareness. Our words, our deeds, our very presence in the world, create and leave impressions in the minds of others just as a writer makes impressions with his pen on paper, the painter with his brush on canvas, the potter with his fingers in clay. The human world is like a vast musical instrument on which we simultaneously play our part while listening to the compositions of others. The creation of ourself in the image of awakening in not a subjective but an intersubjective process. We cannot choose whether to engage with the world, only how to. Our life is a story being continuously related to others through every detail of our being: facial expressions, body language, clothes, inflections of speech – whether we like it or not.”

       Batchelor S. “Buddhism without beliefs. A contemporary guide to awakening.” Riverhead Books, NY, 1997.



 

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