A Buddhist perspective

A group drawing
of a group moving.

Arinna Aweisman came to yesterday’s workshop, on her way through Sydney after leading a Buddhist meditation retreat at Bundanoon. Eager to share our thoughts on drawing and moving, we meet again.

Beneath shade trees in a Sydney garden, we tell about our work.

A.

I understand the reason we’re alive is to become conscious – to become aware of ah …ourselves and ourselves in relationship, and that so much of that consciousness will, or ….awareness …that first comes into being, is painful, because it’s acknowledging the deep sense of separation and alienation that we are living in, because of our not seeing, and …our blindness.

In Buddhism we call it ignorance. And that …that blindness and not seeing is manifested in not…not …also seeing the consequences of our action, and our thoughts. And …so, so to become aware… to start to come into relationship with ourselves and the world… (drone of a low aeroplane drowns out speech)…is what a spiritual process is. It’s an awakening process. And it’s something that brings caring and love.

And … any…any…any…place…is a gateway. Any place, whether internally or externally …it’s a gateway, and for…for… and for reasons that would probably take a long time to explore, but would be exciting to do… Antarctica is …feels like it is …a particularly illuminated gateway for some of us because of what’s going on and um, you know it’s sort of like the 100th monkey. That feels like it’s the …Antarctica …is that, you know …it’s like that turning point, of saying: Look, we know that this is going on, and this is going on, and this is telling us, so it’s explicitly, the gateway we’re falling into, really, with that possibility of becoming more conscious.

And …you know…what some of us are called to is to embody that consciousness in other fields…than the scientific. Because to know something fully is to know it in all ways, and not just one way. And so scientists, because of their particular predilection of wanting to know one way, others of us are feeling called to know it in another way.

Because until it’s fully known, we can’t enter into right relation with it. You know, and we can’t address it.

Right relationship …in the sense of how to come into …for each of us as a citizen of the world… how to come into a relationship …to be a leader. Or another way of saying it is, to become god or goddess or red spirit …how to take…how to embody knowing, and through that embodiment, start to take leadership in addressing the challenges that we have in front of us. If we don’t address the challenges, we’re not going to live, you know, as a planet any more.

And so …embodiment, for me, in my own practice, is touching the depth of being that is not limited in any way …that is limitless. And in that, holding in that, holding …suffering. You know, holding it without reaction. Because when we can hold, truly, what’s going on, without reaction, then we’re in an embodied relationship to it.

And then, and then, coming out of that naturally will be responses. At least it won’t be shutting the door, back into denial and ignorance. But more than that, if it’s a gateway, if the Antarctic and other things …I’m just using the Antarctic because that’s what you’re doing …if the Antarctic is a gateway, then it’s also about our own personal …it is about our own personal …journey, as well.

And so moving, and art, and other things…are not about the sort of objective reality here. It is about an inner listening. Any form, it feels like, any form can take us on that journey.

You know, there’s just one other thought that’s come to me as you were talking (about Antarctic animation), and that is that the particular gateway …another way to say it …and this is Jungian, is that sometimes historically there are mirrors that magnify the deep contradictions that are in our life. And that the Antarctic is one of them. And by knowing and facing more fully that contradiction, there comes…there’s a healing.

In therapy, you know, we skirt around stuff and skirt around stuff, and finally, you know, there it is! Whatever it is. And that’s the mirror that needs …that’s reflecting what needs …to be known.

So when you talk about animation, it feels like you’re talking about that knowing process …how to make known …but how to make known in different …not media …that’s the wrong word …fields of awareness? That’s not quite right either. ….some word …level? …no that’s not quite right either, but anyway. In different manifestations or expressions, of life, body, mind, movement, that kind of stuff. So yeah! Yes.

When I was in Argentina I went to the southern tip of Argentina …in Glacier National Park …and saw the glaciers, you know, and there is something totally profound about it …that landscape. It is, it’s very profound. and to watch chunks of ice falling off, and cracking …it’s really an amazing experience, to do that, to witness that, and to witness that not as a disembodied tourist …(in the sense that) ‘this has nothing to do with me’ …to witness it as life …meeting life. So I understand why that would be such a calling.

L.

That’s interesting that you’ve had a personal connection with the ice. I see it as a moving landscape …that moves me, and many others.

A.

That’s right.

L.

Tell me about your work.

A.

I am …I am sort of interested in the same thing …in creating conditions for consciousness, for knowing, to come into being …about whatever experience is happening in the moment and so the Buddha had an incredible map of the mind, in terms of how to bring this about. And so the practice of being present and being aware …of my own process and of what’s going on outside of me …that practice has brought some deep inner changes. and so from that, from those changes, I felt moved to share what’s been transforming for me. You know there is an incredible array of different teachers …from the traditional monks… most sexist tradition ….misogynistic tradition, to people like me, who are incredibly creative and like to take the essential teachings and include forms, like movement. In most of my personal retreats most of my retreat time has been quite formal …in terms of sitting and walking, sitting and walking …meditating, sitting in a formal posture, formal walking practice, and just going back and forth and back and forth. I the last years, I did a three month retreat at home alone and I did more art. I did art. The art was kind of …because I was feeling kind of guilty about it, in a way, like ‘I’m not practising properly’ …I sort of put the art in …sort of set it aside …like ‘here’s my formal practice, and here’s my art.’ But this retreat I just did, I totally integrated it. and I used journaling, and drawing and this artwork and movement to follow any place that I experienced as an obstacle. (See Rosalind Crisp)

So any place that my mind couldn’t open to in a natural flow, then I would move into this exploration around it, using drawing, colour, and movement. And so what I understood is that when the mind can’t open to something it’s because it’s in this contraction in a habitual …because contractions means habitual, automatically …when the mind is in reaction, or contraction. So how to get out of that …how to get out of it without …how to move out of it into spaciousness so then you could go back in to hold what the experience is. And so, you know, as I told you, my guideline for myself was hat I couldn’t do anything that felt comfortable, or that felt like I knew it, or or that felt familiar. You know, so I did that with the paper, and I did it with my movement, like if I felt myself going up like (gestures upwards) …like this is a pattern I’ve repeated many times, I stopped myself doing it. And I would wait. And could …I only let myself move if it was a movement that was new to me. Now of course I did lots of movements that I’d done before …but it happened in a relationship that was new. Because I didn’t think about it first, so it was like, I couldn’t think about what I was doing. I had to do it, and it had to come out of that silence or emptiness. Or another way to say it is non-thought. What I noticed was the immediate manifestation of an incredible amount of joy. Just a lot of joy, and just fun. Like, having fun, and feeling very joyous and I think the other thing you know the other thing that was lovely about it …this retreat, was finding the balance between doing it, but not getting sucked in because it was fun, to doing it too much, ’cause then in a way the mind could become lazy. So it was like balancing it between than and really doing the formal practice, of being very precise, of knowing the moment, and what the sensation was, in a more formal way. It actually gives you a lot of strength. And I found I had very big insights, at least on a psychological level, ’cause I had insights on the universal level …but on the psychological level that I found just really helpful.

L.
You talked to me the other day about moving in the landscape. Here in Australia? Was that here in Australia?

A.
Yeah. In Bundanoon …has 100 acres of wild land. But I’d done that before, you know, moving in landscape, because when I was in California, living in communes a lot of what was very beautiful about living in communes in the 70’s was that were were extremely uninhibited. You know, we didn’t wear clothes, and we were challenging everything. And we moved! You know, we moved to drums outside, and really explored different ways in movement, in space, on land. and I’ve done that, ever since then. Also, growing up in Africa, where dance is so important, as part of the whole culture. And music. Dance and music. In taking peyote …a medicine we call it …a mind altering substance …the only times I took it was in ritual. There’s a church called the Native American Peyote Church where you sit up all night at solstice and equinox and you pray, with the raffle. And the raffle goes around and around in a circle all night and you take peyote as your spirit helper, to see …what you need to see. And usually you sit down, but there was one time I got up and danced. There was something that happened then in that dance where I found a connection to dancing to the earth. I always wanted to be a dancer when I was young …I trained for years as a ballet dancer, from 6 to 14. I felt a sense that the dance brought me home to the land, to that deep relationship, body to body …my body to the earth, and my being to the being of the earth. So yeah, I move. I go outside and I move to whatever is happening at the moment. And again, if I feel like I’m getting into a habitual pattern of movement, I stop. It has to be a direct response tot he moment.

L.
It sounds like you’ve achieved a balance between the internal landscape and the physical landscape …which is what interests me. Because I did a lot of the movement improvisation that was around in the 70s in Melbourne, and it was taken in many different directions by many different people. And I took mine into drawing and painting and animation, and film making. But I kept moving. Some people pursued improvisation, pure improvisation that was much more inward, which was difficult to watch and feel …for me I found it very difficult to connect with. And I couldn’t see the connections they might be making with the external world. So it can be quite a convoluting experience.

A.
I think improvisation, when it’s only your personal expression, is only half way …that in order for it to be a real happening, there has to be a connection outside of one’s self. So yes, I totally agree with you. The invitation is to take what is internal and its manifestation happens in a way that actually is a gate for people …whatever form it is, song, or dance, or art, or colour…that there is something about it that is opening, and connecting. Well you know that already, cause you’re an artist…

L. Holding a camera really helped …the camera actually framing the motion of the world beyond me, through the lens, helped me make that connection between what was happening in here, and the world. And so to draw and to animate was like a thread between me and the rest of the world. I’m still working on it! And profoundly bewildered by Antarctica …we are living at the height of a culture of arrogance, technological arrogance, which says, ‘well we may have only just discovered Antarctica a hundred years ago, but science will work it all out …and we’ll just sort of do what we want with it …make what we will with it. It bewilders me how little we know. It seems the more I learn about what’s known of Antarctica, the more I learn about what scientists are unsure of, what they don’t understand. It’s a strange place. And that’s wonderful! I was really interested to hear you talk about opening up to strangeness in order to hold that strangeness, because unless we can hold it we can’t see it. And we don’t need to understand, but we just need to connect …

A.
Although I do …I think the beauty of Buddhism is that names very particularly the process that needs to happen, because that holding is a seeing, but it’s not a conceptual seeing, you know, so that I could see you, right now, but that doesn’t mean that I’m really seeing you. And the really seeing part is that …awareness, or mindfulness, or whatever you call it, brings, and so it’s …when I think of everything going on, I watch myself go into two different responses, depending on my level of awareness.

On the one hand I just go into how messed up the world is, and how messed up minds are, specially political minds, and and just being out of relationship to devastation that’s going on, because I’ve an aversion to it; I don’t want it. I don’t want to see it. And I don’t like it. And I’m in that place of hating. I hate the politicians. I have what the corporations are doing. So there’s that one response.

Then the other response …because I’ve seen my own suffering, and my own ignorance, I mean I’ve seen clearly and deeply how profoundly judgemental my mind is …and I’ve seen how greedy I am …and I don’t mean that in a judgemental sense, I’ve just seen my mind lock onto something and want it strongly. Because I’ve seen it and been able to embrace it …and then, when I see it outside, it’s embraced …so I can say, ‘I know that’. I have the blessing of knowing it. Because I know it and see it, I’m released from it’s grip. And so that holding has that seeing in it.

And so that …holding the Antarctic, that’s seeing the deep suffering and pain …of minds, of both the beauty and magnificence of it, and of the tragedy of minds held in greed and hatred. And I don’t think it’s possible to hold that until we see it inside of ourselves.

L.
Antarctica has often been described as a mirror, a place we go to, to reflect upon ourselves. It’s a mirror in every way. That vast expanse of white is mirroring the light. Ad as that mirror melts …our relationship to the light is changing. It’s huge stuff.

A.
And it becomes overwhelming, unless you see it in yourself. you know it feels like that has to be the starting place, and that for me is, you know, a …and that knowing …it can happen through any practice, like …you know, your class, though I do have a predilection to saying …I haven’t found a way other than having a formal practice …formal meditation practice …and spending two months, maybe a year, on formal retreat, to get that quiet to do that seeing, in order to hold what we’re talking about. You know I don’t think there’s a lot of other options, you know, whether you have a quietness of Buddhist practice, or something else. But to have that quietness and cultivating that kind of awareness. People do it in different ways.

L.
I was thinking of the New Zealand artist Colin McCann. …makes monumental paintings of exquisitely simple motifs that speak to many people. And to do this work, he’s alone, for long periods of time…

So I’m trying to balance, in my own practice, working with people, and working alone. And finding my place in a dance.

A.
It changes through time …what we need. And when you talk about working with people …your classes, you’re teaching movement and art and stuff …

L.
I’ve also got a sculptor and an installation/landscape artist who I meet with. We’ve started to meet regularly …and we bring our work, or the materials we’re working with, into the space and we share and respond. And it’s quite mysterious and wonderful.

A.
Well I think specially when you’re in the process of doing something like a PhD, it’s a time for a lot of connections …it’s what we were talking about before, of taking what’s inside, and finding a way to put it in connection, you know? And that’s what it sounds like you’re doing. And that’s so beautiful. It’s not like some total internal process …it’s so relational

L.
And I’m doing my journaling on-line

A.

Wow! Wow, that’s really brave.

L.
It’s very brave of the people who reply to me, as well. I have people reply, and they become part of the shaping of the project.

A.
You journal …you just journal …there’s no censorship at all?

L.
Of course I self-censor. I have the sort of conversations that we’re having now …where there’s basic human respect and listening. I’m very interested in what people have to say about some of the questions that are thrown to me about …by my supervisor, for example …who put a question to me just recently about dance. It was provocative, non-judgemental question about …a good question: Can dance be more than just a personal expression? What is it that dance can reveal other than our personal flaws and limitations? And of course, it’s like any other art. It’s something from within, that we make, to connect with each other and the world, ourselves. This idea of a personal expression is that idea of a convoluted, inward-looking mode that we were talking about before …which is one mode. Art making is about connecting. I believe.

A.
As you’re talking what comes to me is that difference between a personal journey that has …that’s not the right word …where we are still working out issues, personal issues. So then it’s sort of very inward looking …because we’re still in the process of working out those issues. And another way to say it is that we’re not free of them. We’re not free of the hold of those issues, or complexes, or …wounds. And so when we speak from that place, not that it isn’t interesting. I’ve gone to some theatre by black teenagers where it’s very much their working out their personal stuff, you know, they’re angry and they’re giving voice to that anger. And I want to support that process of healing, so I’ll sit in the audience. But it’s not art. It feels like that place …where it moves …where we’re released from it …the hold …so that if we dance it or say it or speak it, because we’re released from the hold, there’s the space around it. And the spaciousness is when people can come in …to connect. You know?

L.
That’s beautifully put! Yes. And one of the things one of my art teachers used to say was that making an art object can be like a dialogue, a conversation you have …the material speaks to you …you respond …etc. And then when it doesn’t need you any more, and it has its own space around it, then it’s complete. And you can walk away and let it go. Some people have said to me, ‘How could you possibly sell that?’ or let that out of your like? Well that’s the joy of making something that has a life of its own. It has other lives.

A.
That’s right. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Can I …I should …I wanted to ask you, if you don’t mid me asking you. You an tell me to back off if you want to …what do you think falling in love with this man …what is it about what you’re doing …and falling in love with him, that is parallelling?

L.
Parallelling.

A. This is a very …maybe linear way of looking at it, but I’ve been married three times to women, and um …I feel like falling in love with someone and being in a relationship is about healing a wound. And that doesn’t mean to say there aren’t incredible blessings ..you know, the joy of companionship, of doing things together, whether it’s living together, or gardening or whatever …but I think essentially it’s about healing a wound …that the people we fall in love with are the people who trigger our deepest wounds. And, it just struck me so much that you’re doing this project, and you fell in love.

L.
Interesting question. Because you know you were talking before about the place that you find the hardest to go, or the movement – the gesture you make that’s the hardest to make … To me, answering that question is really hard, because it is so true. (voice sounds suddenly richer) There is definitely a healing process happening. For both of us. And the only way I feel I can shape my understanding of that is through the art, because, we can’t talk. It’s not one of those relationships where we talk for hours …and yet I have a strong sense of his profound connection with the land. But he’s the most skeptical, pragmatic man. And I deeply connect with him on that level.

A.
Of being deeply skeptical and pragmatic.

L.
Oh. no no no no no …connecting with the land. And I feel in many ways …the irony of our relationship is that he …I get a sense that he connects with the land more closely that I do …and that I’m still struggling with this whole thing …my father …and our lovers can very often reflect our parents …was very like Ken …in his pragmatism and withdrawal and I know that I have that quality …cross-legged …but I deeply move towards the opposite …with difficulty though.

And I’ve just been to Melbourne and done two very intense days with a movement therapist, and identified some of the physical places in my body that are not moving so much as others.

So this is an amazing meeting I’m having with you.

A.

Just thinking about it …I was thinking Why did I choose to go into a monastic setting for two years – because they are so sexist – just horribly so – and you know, I come from a very empowered life,well I have my own centre, I’m an author, and so on and so forth, and yet I went into these settings that triggered my deepest wound. I wouldn’t have said that then, but I say it now …which was not to be seen and heard. And I definitely feel I’ve come out stronger because I’ve had to find that resilience inside of me to believe in myself, because I wasn’t being believed outside of myself. You know, and often I feel like as women that’s the journey we takeover and over again. Because our voices aren’t heard as readily and because we don’t hear them either, it feels like …I’m fifty-seven, and it feels like I’m going through tat journey again …but we do come out more strongly. It’s so much about believing ourselves.

Something else struck me, in how you were talking about his pragmatism and the way the monastic institution teaches the Dharma, which is in a way very pragmatic and I feel like there’s definitely a space for it …but so much of how I teach is very intuitive, and very creative. And there’s something about how my own doubt around my teaching got reflected in the ways they are in the world. , you know the monks and the monastic institution, the whole ordained community …and so when you talked about his pragmatism I just …and the this might be my own personal reflection …I just wanted to give you a lot of support not to … not let that take away from your confidence in your own journey. It feels like, especially for us as older women, that’s where we’re at, you know? Is really becoming authoritative. in our own confidence in the fields that we’re in.

L.
Thank you. I had a very strong sense yesterday, in the class, that this is what I do …most freely and most lovingly. This is what I can offer. And I made it up as I went along. You could see that. I was just making it up. I had a plan. I always have a plan. But it just goes, wfhu… It’s just a process I need to do before i walk into the space. But you don’t know what’s going to happen. and I’ve all my life had great difficulty finding a way to contribute in the world that feels …and I won’t say easy …because that has connotations of an habitual nature …I avoid the habitual.. And I think this is what I have to keep doing. And it’s crazy, because I sort of started to do this years ago but I went in various strange ways. I’ve also bee married – well I’ve been married twice but I’ve have seven long-term relationships. That can happen when you’re 58. That’s quite a few. I just didn’t marry all of them. Because I fall in love. And I love those journeys of feeling. And I am aware of that as it’s happening. I’ve been on many journeys of feeling. I love feeling healed and contributing to someone else’s healing. But that can’t be all.

But I’m finding, with those project, that I’m finding that balance, between pragmatism and feeling, within myself. And I find understanding the science, the scientific data that I’m dealing with, terribly difficult to get me head around, but that’s why I’m doing it. I never take the easy path.

A.
Well because it is, because it’s important. It is important …all those channels of understanding are important to relate on that level and to know. Because that’s been the predominant and male way of knowing. That place, (that woman’s place?), of not listening and not hearing, I still feel sometimes. And so I have to be specially conscious when I’m in those more formal worlds not to …to open to them from a place of strength and confidence. I think that’s the challenge.

L.
It seems to have recorded. I’m going to transcribe this and Email it to you and ask you what I can use of it.

A.
All of it.

L.
On-line?

A.
I don’t see why not.

L.
I trained in a culture of withholding, and possessiveness of one’s practice, and technologies, and iconography …The Antarctic culture, is by decree, is all about sharing the knowledge and the understanding and the methods.

A.
And you know what? In Buddhism, all my Dhama talks are freely …given freely. The teachings are given freely. That’s the tradition.