I’ve been thinking about a comment Gartenfische left on my post exploring St. Francis’ early illness about pain being a constant, but suffering being a choice. What makes us suffer over some things and not others?I have a condition called scleroderma which has caused my hands to contract almost into fists. However, I don’t suffer over it at all. In fact the only time I ever think of it is when people stare. On the other hand, I suffer greatly with my menstrual cycle but only for a few hours a month. The first thing effects everything I do and yet doesn’t move me, the second effects me a few hours a month and takes a huge toll.I have to ask why? And, then, I will have to ask what I need to polish within myself to clear the way for God. My attachment to suffering is like dirt on a mirror. It keeps me from fully reflecting my Source in my life and through my art.
St Francis
St. Francis: His early Illness
I’m reading St. Bonaventure’s (1217-1274 CE) Life of St. Francis. Early in St Francis’ life, before he embarked on the path to sainthood, he became seriously ill. He as just a regular young man until this illness transformed him. This is what Bonaventure says about it:
Since affliction can enlighten our spiritual awareness (Isa. 28:19), the hand of the Lord came upon him (Ezech. 1:3), and the right hand of God effected a change in him (Ps. 76:11). God afflicted his body with a prolonged illness in order to prepare his soul for the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
It was after he recovered that he began to take on the role of mystic. I’ve written a lot lately about the beauty and role of illness in spirituality. I find it everywhere throughout mystical literature. St. Francis left few writings, he taught through the example of his life. The numerous transformations he under went to become one with God are intense. I’ve written about a few of them before, including the meaning of his stigmata. His life shows the effect of illness Divinely given and humanly accepted. Tomorrow I’ll post about some medieval women mystics who cultivated suffering as a way of serving humanity. This is a completely different, willful thing.Bonaventure’s writings are beautiful. Besides his Life of St. Francis, I also love The Soul’s Journey into God. In it he describes the physical world as “vestiges,” foot print of God. Every living creature and every object contains God’s grandeur. I spent one summer trying to apply this to everything I saw: Chihuahuas, garbage, car exhaust, hideous neon yellow jackets, you name it. I finally started to get and now it seems like second nature after of years of practice. Well most of the time! Heavy perfume and spitting still get me!
Skipping Etching
I have to skip my etching studio time again today. It’s frustrating but I’m trying to breathe with it. It’s a continual process understanding who is in charge. It’s not me. Most people have the illusion that they control their own lives. I don’t have that luxury. But luxury can be deadening, connection is of much greater importance.
Hildegard of Bingen: Illness & God
When I was first introduced to Hildegard of Bingen in 1987, it was a revelation to me. First I was taken by her visions and writing, but it’s the story of her life that has really effected me. Hildegard lived a life of Divine direction. She was the youngest of 10 children and, as was common at the time, was place in a convent at a young age probably to defray costs. It was placement that she had no voice in. Early in her life she had visions. At some point she received a Divine message that she was to write down her visions. When she refused God’s will she became ill, when she wrote she was healed. Later, she had a vision that she was to leave her convent and found her own. Again she refused and again she fell ill. This time she was so sick that she couldn’t even be lifted from her bed. And again, when she accepted her calling she was healed. God literally directed her life.
Much of my life has been about forcing things to happen, pushing for my own desired outcome. But since I became ill with scleroderma, that has gradually changed. God has taught me through my illness to surrender control. Ironically, now even though my life is more limited in some ways because of lower energy and other issues, I am happier and more satisfied with my life. Things, people, guidance, you name it, flow easily into my life because now there is space; space that was filled before with my own pushing, my own foolish will. Now, I wait and God comes. Illness is a road map to the Divine- a precious gift.When I first read Hildegard’s life story I only perceived her connection to God through her mystical visions. But really God spoke to her through every aspect of her life. I am grateful to have account of her life to guide me.
Ouroboros
Yesterday I had a doctor’s appointment. It seemed like a normal appointment until, in the middle of a technical discussion, my doctor described one of my symptoms as a serpent with its tail in its mouth. I was floored. To hear an allopathic doctor refer to an ancient mystical symbol was completely unexpected.
The symbol of a serpent with its tail in its mouth, or Ouroboros (Auroboros/Uroboros), dates back to 1,600 BCE in Ancient Egypt but has been used at many times and in many cultures. I am most familiar with it from from medieval & alchemical manuscripts. (For an interesting discussion by contemporary alchemists click here.)
The Ouroboros contains so many meanings: the circular, cyclical nature of time, regeneration and rebirth, and all is one to name a few. My doctor used this symbol to describe a situation that once started, feeds on itself. He described it like a storm, once it starts it continues going round and round much like a tornado or “a snake with its tail in its month”.
If the Ouroboros contains the meaning that all ‘existence’ is one, one of its meanings must be Divine Intelligence. According to Plotinus, the One (emptiness, non-existence, & the womb of God) emanates Divine Intelligence, which is primal existence, pure Being. The Intelligence then emanates more forms, but It is the first division with the Godhead. Before it there is Nothingness, non-being. That the Ouroboros represents the oneness of “all existence” means it must necessarily represent the One’s first emanation: the Intelligence. Divine Intelligence or Reason cannot be comprehended by man. It seems, much like a tornado, to be a state of complete chaos. The moments of chaos in our lives, therefore, are moments when we come closest to knowing God’s existence.
I have always understood that my physical ailments are divinely sent. They have been my greatest teacher, my Guru so to speak, my guide into the hidden mysteries of life. But, sometimes this can be forgotten in the daily grind of life. Yesterday, in a phrase, the symbol of the Ouroboros reminded me of the gift I have been given: the closeness of my embrace with the Divine.
Update: As with most symbols, this one works on many levels. On one level it represents the Intelligence, but on another level it can represent the One as well. It is the union of opposites, the end (the tail) and the beginning (the head) at the same time. Its circularity recalls the Womb of God, the nothingness, precipitated by holding two opposites as one, which births forth the Universe. During the medieval period they also spoke of this state as the squared circle.
An Artistic Time-Out?
Maybe I’ve been spending too much time with young children lately, but it seems like recently the universe gave me a time-out. I have one day a week in the etching studio. So every time I go in, I push like crazy to get as much done as I can. The problem was I spent so much energy trying to “do,” I was stealing from, blocking the Divine creative flow. I was trying to control something which can not be controlled.
So, the last 2 weeks I became ill on my etching day and couldn’t go in. In the past, I would have tired to push and go in. Now I am trying to live without control. So I stayed home and waited. Then I waited some more.
Today I felt compelled to pick up my dry point, in preparation for my studio time tomorrow, and it was as if a wall had dissolved. I have a freedom and flow that was absent before. I’m a grateful that I trusted the experience that was sent to me instead of trying to control it. There is merit in waiting.
Tomorrow I will post some of my prints.
Winter- When an Artist Rests
Halloween wore me out completely. Because of it, I've missed my etching studio time & my ceramics class. So what does an artist do when we can't create?I'm believe that for artists, the times we are not working are just as important as the times we are. When we are working, tremendous amounts of energy and information flow through us into the world. We need time to absorb and integrate that into our systems. Like perennial flowers, we need to rest between flowering. These quiet times are like winter in a garden. It looks dead and lifeless, but the roots are charging for the explosion of spring.Anyway, that's how I'm consoling myself for missing my working time this week....
What St. Francis Tells the Artist
There is a 14th century manuscript included in Francis and Clare: The Complete Works (The Classics of Western Spirituality), which describe what St. Francis considers “perfect joy”. I can’t tell you how much this story has helped me. I’ve paraphrased it here:
Brother Leo asks St. Francis, “What is perfect joy?” St. Francis replies listing the things that would logically bring him great happiness: If all the masters in Paris join my order, it would not be perfect joy. Or if all the masters in Europe, and the King of France joined the order, that would not be perfect joy. And if all the non-believers in the world were converted and I had the grace from God to heal all sickness, that would not be true joy.
(Okay, so what would it be? Get ready!)
“I return from Perugia and arrive here in the dead of the night and it is winter time, muddy and so cold that icicles have formed on the edges of my habit and keep striking my legs, and blood flows from the wounds. And all covered with mud and cold, I come to the gate and after I have knocked and called for some time, a brother comes and asks: “Who are you?” I answer: “Brother Francis.” And he says: “Go away; this is not a proper hour for going about; you may not come in.” And when I insist, he answers: “Go away, you are a simple and a stupid person; we are so many and we have no need of you. You are certainly not coming to us at this hour!” And I stand again at the door and say: “For the love of God, take me in tonight!” And he answers: “I will not. Go to the Croisers’ place and ask there.” I tell you this: If I had patience and did not become upset, there would be true joy in this…” (p.165-6)
It is this passage that inspired me to make an altar of St Francis’ feet. How can seeming misery be joy? Illness and wounds, whether physical or metaphorical, can bring enormous suffering. Our experiences of pain are mirrored for us by St. Francis' stigmata. On my altar I planted the aloe vera plants in his stigmata to show that our wounds can bring healing to our lives. But this, St. Francis counsels us, is only possible through acceptance not struggle. It is struggle that produces suffering, and acceptance which produces joy. There are, in fact, things that happen in each life that can not be changed and which seem completely unacceptable, things like severe illness, disfiguration or scars, & the death of a loved one to name a few. St. Francis shows us that there can be happiness, even joy in the face of these terrible events and from that healing. Pain & joy are not mutually exclusive emotions and healing depends on the coexistence of the two.
I mention this only because it is so easy to be thrown by the events of life and to forgo making art. But art is life blood to an artist and we must learn not to be crippled in the face of great obstacles rather we must create.
Are you only as good as your last piece?
The question as asked in Gloria Dean's Blog is interesting to think about, but I believe this is question misses the true point of making art. Art is not about our own assessments of good and bad, it's about the work's relationship to world and its viewers. It is next to impossible for an artist to judge the true purpose or quality of their own work.
Case in point, several years ago I painted a piece about the Binding of Isaac. It is the moment Isaac hands are bound by his father for his sacrifice. The decision to paint the rope tying around his hands as actual Hebrew words from the Bible was automatic. I went through a period of illness, the painting lay abandoned, then judged by me as not so hot. Some time later I had the painting in a gallery and a woman in a wheelchair came in. She was in an almost reclining position. She had oxygen pumped to her nose, and she seem to only have movement in her arms and head. Her wheelchair was electric and she was determined to get into the gallery by herself. She wasn't going to be bound by her illness. I watched her struggle as she finally made it in, immediately drawn to my painting. I could see something in her body language shift as she looked at it.She told me part of her story: she was an ultra-orthodox Jew who had left her faith. Something out the Hebrew lettering and the image spoke to her about her illness. I don't think I've ever had someone understand my own work on a level so much deeper than my own understanding before. By seeing her reaction I received new meaning for the painting which helped me understand my own illness. Clearly, I had made this work for her and never known it. She said it helped to ease her. Sometimes we must surrender to our bonds to achieve freedom.By judging our own work & keeping locked away, we not only block ourselves but block the Divine. Our paintings and works of art can be portals for the creative flow of healing energy into the world. If we are truly creating, it's not coming from us, but through us. We are the filter through which light can pour. A filter is necessary for otherwise, the light would blind us. This is an awesome gift and responsibility- the responsibility not to judge. Even a piece, which by traditional artistic standards may not be great, may have a greater purpose. We don't and can't know. It's up to use to be humble enough to allow the process to work through us.