{"id":4508,"date":"2016-08-02T10:51:30","date_gmt":"2016-08-02T17:51:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeinfullcolor.com\/?p=4508"},"modified":"2016-08-02T10:51:30","modified_gmt":"2016-08-02T17:51:30","slug":"august-2-2016-mindfulness-simplified","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeinfullcolor.com\/dev\/life-stories\/august-2-2016-mindfulness-simplified\/","title":{"rendered":"August 2, 2016 – Mindfulness, simplified…"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n \n \"Fb-Button\"\n <\/a>\n <\/div>
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\""Just

“Just finished this little one (15″ x 15″). My painting to keep my promise to paint every day.”<\/p><\/div>\n

Listen to this post:<\/p>\nhttp:\/\/www.lifeinfullcolor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/20160802-Post.m4a<\/a><\/audio>\n

Right after sending off last week\u2019s post, Joe, Bo (our puppy dog) and I went on a hike, and the thing that I couldn’t remember, came back to me! A victory of memory recall! Yay! The source of the \u201cwisdom of not<\/em> knowing\u201d, was a TED talk by Ellen Langer<\/a>, a social psychologist who is known for her decades-long work on mindfulness. She\u2019s been talking about it for longer than most, and in a way that is simpler, than I\u2019d ever heard described before. My understanding of practicing mindfulness, as Buddhists talk about it, is: sitting in meditation, being present to our minds, our thoughts and practicing letting them go. Ellen Langer describes mindfulness, in contrast to mindlessness \u2013 mindfulness is simply \u201cactively noticing new things.\u201d This sounds to me like being awake and aware versus being on auto-pilot. Ellen Langer says we form a point of view, based on our experiences and then we get fixed there. This fixation has us make assumptions and see things from only one perspective \u2013 the one based upon our life-so-far. But if we learn to become open, curious, not stuck in our own way of thinking, life is a wide open field of possibility.<\/p>\n

Her work, as she talks about it in her videos online, is fascinating. She has learned, that how we think, changes our reality in all kinds of ways \u2013 relationships, what becomes possible for our lives, even the state of our physical bodies and our health. I am a naturally inquisitive person, and I realize how this has impacted my capacity to live a life of transformation. My dear friend Stephanie has come to join me in Tahoe for a few days, and as dear girlfriends do, we\u2019ve been talking for hours \u2013 about our stories, our lives, our histories. Yesterday I reflected, as we talked on the person I was in my 20\u2019s. Other than my family, there is hardly anything about my life, how I operate, how I see the world, how I see myself<\/em> and what I hold possible, that is the same as then. \u201cWhat if\u2026.\u201d is a state of being for me. And as I evolve, my curiosity seems to be growing ever larger.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t to say, that I\u2019m open and curious and in the field of possibility, all the time! Like everyone, I forget thousands of times a day. But, it\u2019s my experience, and thus has become my commitment, that keeping this kind of information coming in on a regular basis, sets me up to return to mindfulness more easily – and<\/em> progressively more frequently. Interactions \u2013 especially with people I am close to – are always a place to practice. Here\u2019s how she says we can shift things: if I realize that someone\u2019s behavior makes sense from their perspective \u2013 their world view, (which they may be mindlessly stuck in), it changes my view that they are \u2013 from my<\/em> world view – misbehaving. This then opens me, to see, that there is always the other side of the coin. If I see someone as rigid, I have one experience of them, but if I shift to seeing them as principled and reliable, it\u2019s a whole other. Change a word or two, and we get vastly different effects.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s quite evident that our world has become more contentious, more filled with conflict – violence even, than I can ever remember it. We are in an epidemic of edginess and testiness, and just being done<\/em> with the state of things. This is happening, of course, in all the big ways that make the news, but I\u2019m seeing it also in more local and even personal ways. The festival I did in June, has been a pretty crappy art show for many years, in fact, it was even worse in the midst of the recession, but it was this<\/em> year that conversation took off like wildfire on the local Nextdoor websites, about how shamefully it reflects upon the Town of San Anselmo, and how something must<\/em> be done about it. Just on this vacation, someone left a really nasty note, about how we parked our car and a guy gave my husband stink eye, at seeing our dog at the beach. I\u2019ve been watching people around me, including me \u2013 reaching the end of our ropes \u2013 saying, \u201cI won\u2019t take<\/em> that from you anymore!\u201d In the midst of this, I\u2019ve decided to take on attempting to not react, not to judge \u2013 or at least to not to act upon<\/em> my judgement. Preventing judgement seems just about impossible to me – most of the time! It is my intention to up my game on remaining open hearted.<\/p>\n

\""One

“One (22″ x 22″) of a single apple – working on not judging how these leaves are coming out!”<\/p><\/div>\n

Yesterday, Steff and I were flat on our bellies on our towels at the beach, when Steff asked me what I was going to write about today. A word popped into my head: allowing. Allowing? If we are at the end of our rope, doesn\u2019t it seem that \u201callowing\u201d is just what we are no longer willing to do? As I started to talk it out with Steff, I started to see how, allowing as a necessary step in being able to really see and even possibly receive, what is happening for someone else – or even in the larger world. Combining \u201cI\u2019m done\u201d with \u201callowing\u201d, or maybe following \u201cI\u2019m done\u201d with the capacity to allow what is – is a paradox, that feels what\u2019s called for. It ends the tug of war and lands me in that field of possibility, that invites what\u2019s next to emerge. Creative change becomes then possible.<\/p>\n

\""I

“I need to just allow how long this one is taking – I’ve never taken on one so big (40″ x 40″) with so much details!”<\/p><\/div>\n

As always, the next question that comes up in my head is: how does this relate to making art, painting, being creative? There\u2019s no shortage of pre-conceived notions in artists \u2013 especially when we just start out or are returning to making art. We may have experiences of making art in our past – what has been said to us, or about our art – that forms a world-view, from which we come to our art making. We can practice allowing, being aware and curious \u2013 being mindful<\/em> about ourselves and our perspective. From here, we have more freedom and permission to jump in \u2013 plus, it just might open us to something completely new and unexpected.<\/p>\n

Ellen Langer offered the idea of noticing something new about our people in our lives every day, as a way to keep our relationships vital. It occurs to me in this moment to ask, what if I do that about my own art making? What is new about my creative impulses, that I can allow to come into my awareness today? I have no idea! Here I am back to the wisdom of \u201cnot knowing.\u201d There is a gift, at being at the end of our rope. It is the catalyst for what\u2019s next – which is what propels us along in our evolution \u2013 not just each of us individually, but all of humanity. In my life, it is just what has brought me closer and closer to painting my true love, and the capacity to be whole-hearted. I never want to know all there is to know about what I do; I want my last breath to be filled with curiosity.<\/p>\n

Thank you for reading \u2013 it\u2019s always a gift to me.<\/p>\n

With my love,<\/p>\n

Cara<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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