Rejuvenated

Brisbane has an annual Tibetan Festival that was celebrated last weekend. At the Powerhouse they had a free talk with the very appealing title – Luminous Nature of Mind. We arrived at the Powerhouse to find folk in traditional Tibetan costumes and stalls selling Tibetan wares and food. On the Turbine Platform was a monk working on a sand mandala with careful attention, which set the scene for the arrival of Buddhist master, Khensur Rinpoche Geshe Tashi Tsering. Born in Tibet he has been a teaching between Australia and India since 1990. Accompanying him was a female monk to translate his teachings. As they settled onto the stage in their maroon robes there was contagious giggling from them both. It was a delight to look at their faces, which seemed to shine with loving-kindness. Watching them made me want to seek out the knowledge that had led them to this state.

Khensur Rinpoche started by explaining the three parts that make a sentient being – body, mind and I/me. The body we get from our parents, the mind is by its nature clear and knowing or LUMINOUS. Sadly we let mental factors, afflictions suck as jealously or a sense of entitlement enter into the nature of the mind resulting in a muddiness. “Our responsibility is to EDUCATE our minds!” We need to choose to educate our mind, we can choose either wisdom or ignorance, happiness or suffering. Happiness is a positive virtuous state of mind. Suffering is caused by delusions, ignorance, attachment, indifference and anger or negative emotions. We need wisdom to listen carefully, with wisdom comes less mental affliction, less negativity and it reduces doubt. Therefore because the nature of mind is luminous negative emotions can be got rid of.

When someone hits you with a stick, do you get angry with the stick? No because the stick is not in control.  Khensur Rinpoche urges us to think in the same way about the person wielding the stick, they also are not in control of their mind. In this way we can tap into our compassion and think “Oh you poor thing”. So the way to educate your mind is to study and practice: Loving-Kindness + Compassion + Meditation = Wisdom

Listening to Khensur Rinpoche helps me to rejuvenate my meditation, which after eleven years of almost regular practice still faces harsh resistance from my sub-conscious.

Also helpful is reading Jon Kabat-Zinn, in Coming to our Senses he gently challenges our way of thinking about meditation. “Meditation is a way of being, not a technique, meditation is a way of being appropriate to the circumstances one finds oneself in, in any given moment… Awareness itself is the teacher, the student and the lesson.” He then continues with a succinct expression of the profundity of the practice,

“I have come to see meditation as an act of love, an inward gesture of benevolence and kindness toward ourselves and toward others, a gesture of the heart that recognizes our perfection even in our obvious imperfection, with all our shortcomings, our wounds, our attachments, our vexations, and our persistent habits of unawareness.”

With the words of these two seers in my ears I am illuminated and rejuvenated.

Meteor

Sitting on a roof deck in Fingal over Easter head turned west after a magnificent sunset over the mountains. At the edge of my field of vision, just above my head suddenly an atmospheric phenomenon appears. A shiny ball of light streaking south-west, involuntarily I shout out – all heads turn. IT’S A METEOR! We are unused to seeing one so close, so low, so long suspended before our eyes – then it flashes from sight, disappears.

I am left breathless and my heart feels full, but also tingling. It’s respectful fear, known as awe. It reminds me of research from Berkeley's Greater Good Science Center – that experiencing the awe of nature is beneficial. It helps us gain perspective, to remember we are a small part of a bigger universe. A universe that can nurture and sustain us, just this week they sent me a link to a guided awe walk. Dacher Keltner talks us through a virtual tour of Muir Woods, named after John Muir.

I discovered the existence of John Muir last year when I was looking for beautiful quotes about how wonderful being in nature can feel. John Muir was a protector of forests, he saw them as places of sanctuary necessary for harmony. His life was filled with hiking, sleeping under the stars and transposing these experiences into his diaries.

“Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.” John Muir

Meteor: a small body of matter from outer space that enters the earth's atmosphere, becoming incandescent as a result of friction and appearing as a streak of light.

Why is it so?

I was talking with a young doctor about how a fascination with neuroscience had led in part to the idea of Mindsettle. He asked me why I found neuroscience interesting, so I talked about how inspiring the work of Baroness Susan Greenfield is to me, how Norman Doige’s books had made the subject so accessible, how reading John Medina’s BRAIN RULES had given me insights into how we learn and how meeting some of the researchers at Queensland Brian Institute (QBI) led to an understanding of some of the guiding principles for a healthy brain. Then one of the kids interrupted the conversation and we moved on with our day.

Yet the question has stayed with me. I think it has something of the fervour of an explorer – that quest to know the unknown. Curiosity and the quest for knowledge lead to more questions than answers. It’s the search that’s the thing, the not knowing rather than the certainties of the absolute. We need to remember that these absolute truths are often opinions based only on the information we have – not all the information that is available. This makes them perhaps only somewhat true, though in some sectors of our society this leads to chest beating and browbeating. When did it become more important to know it all than to not. We need to gather information from all sources not just those that back our version of the truth.

The QBI researchers, all talked about how little is understood about the brain, likening their work to deep space exploration. I heard Lavinia Codd recently speak about watching a neuron regenerate in the lab. The discovery of neuroplasticity is wondrous, it gives me hope that change is endlessly possible. And possibilities encourage feeling hopeful and hope encourages life.

Upheaval

Packing up a houseful of belongings requires thousands of micro-decisions. You look at every piece of clothing, every kitchen utensil, every knick-knack, every household item and decide its fate – keep, bin or donate.

The accumulated effect of all these micro-decisions has for me been a deep fatigue and a retreat from the social whirl. It’s my (introverted) way of regaining strength – we moved in January and I am only now starting to feel recovered.

Towards the end of the move when I couldn’t face sorting out kid’s toys or dress up clothes, I would send in the most ruthless daughter, who without great sentiment would swoop through and clear whole areas in minutes. No agonies of indecision for her.

A helpful film I watched during this time was Minimalism: A Documentary about the Important Things. It profiled a number of Americans who are questioning our society’s avid consumerism. I was particularly impressed by Courtney Carver, whose multiple sclerosis diagnosis prompted her to simplify her life. She started with de-cluttering her wardrobe and while doing so developed Project 333, which her website describes thus: “Project 333 is the minimalist fashion challenge that invites you to dress with 33 items or less for 3 months.”

The documentary concludes that fewer choices about everyday items, like what to wear, leaves our brain with more resources to make better choices overall. Being constantly offered many choices erodes the brain’s capacity to make choices. I feel this sometimes when faced with a large menu or a shop stuffed to the brim with bargains. It feels like a kind of craziness to be lured by these limitless options.

So moving house was clearly the very definition of upheaval: a violent or sudden change or disruption to something. But maybe, just maybe, the impetus to make better choices will be strengthened by the experience.

Resolved

At the start of 2016 I wrote down a few things to work towards

1. Continue to develop Mindsettle
2. Promote Nature Art Connect
3. Write regularly
4. Exhibit a series of art

So at the start of 2017 it's useful to look back, to see if I lived up to my own expectations.

Mindsettle - I spent the year talking to people in science, education and health, these conversations confirmed that the concept is valid. With generous help from Justin Brown a showreel was produced to encapsulate Mindsettle. With the showreel I was able to get a few schools to trial the idea with some of their more anxious students. The upside was they found that it worked to soothe anxiety and restore attention. The downside was that there are so many kids with individual management plans making the idea of incorporating anything more into the schedule of Special Education teachers nigh impossible. By year's enda specialist medical practice had agreed to trial Mindsettle, which means I need to produce two 20 minute films. This filmaking is slowly progressing and the more I do the easier it becomes.

Nature Art Connect - The most frustrating aspect of this lovely idea is how fabulous it could be with the right patronage. Twice in 2016 invitations were posted to social media and an email list without any interest. When Nature Art Connect was pitched to media representatives they could imagine the rich content and nourishment of the experience. This year I will invite friends and family to a Nature Art Connect event for our own enjoyment. I think the patronage could grow organically from there.

Writing - In the past few years I have become more public with my musings by posting blogs on a few websites. In 2016 on lisabehan.com I wrote 26 thoughts about thoughts. Encouraged by the likes of Steve Pressfield and Andrea Gallagher I am tentatively exposing my style to those in my world.

Exhibiting - My intention to hold a solo exhibit did not come to fruition. One of my ink paintings was exhibited in the Milburn Prize. I did do quite a bit of drawing in 2016, mostly inspired by patterns in nature and also from attending public lectures at the Queensland Brain Institute. On the flipside these do get exhibited on Instagram.  There is something really wonderful in seeing a body of work all up on a wall together, you get a sense of themes developing and ideas coalescing, but the effort required wasn't available in 2016. “Some things are up to us, and some things are not up to us.” — Epictetus, Stoic philosopher

In 2017 my work focus will be almost the same, though I have no plans to exhibit in the traditional way. I find the process of reviewing outcomes is useful for me to be clear about how I spend my time.

“Someone once told me the definition of hell; on your last day on earth, the person you could have become will meet the person you became.” — Anonymous

Reading

In 2016 I finally managed to keep a reading list, this a project I have attempted many times before. There's something about designing and updating an excel spreadsheet that doesn't work for me, but I have been convinced by the arguments of James Clear that there is value in measuring what you deem to be important to your life. I can't remember not reading - my favourite place to read has always been in bed. A place to escape, to find refuge, to live alternate lives, to explore other worlds, to discover ways of thinking. So I made it simple with a 1-5 rating followed by a sentence or two to refresh my memory. Out of 56 books read, 21 have been rewarded with the top rating. If you're looking for a good book (and your values are the same as mine), the list below could be useful. Happy Reading!

An American Jew by Steven Pressfield - Steven uses the experience of writing The Lions Gate to explore his place in the world and how he feels about being Jewish.

The Quality of Silence by Rosamund Lupton - Loved it because she has the same themes I'd like to write about - vulnerability, a woman's identity, being an outsider, faith in long term relationships, how men must honour their women, the vice of greed and respect for nature. Used the style of two viewpoints 10 year old Ruby (deaf) and her mother Yasmin, though Adeeb also briefly has his view recorded.

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante - Set in a town close to Naples in the early sixties, it explores the developing friendship between two girls from the age of 4 through to 16.

The Trouble with Goats and Sheep by Joanna Cannon - Gorgeous exposition of the secrets of a neighbourhood looking though the eyes of a young girl. A woman goes missing so Gracie and Tillie decide to look for God in their neighbourhood so he can keep everyone safe.

How to Build a Girl by Caitlin Moran - I love her straight up style, that her female character loves sex, that it explores how we can change our lives to be truer to ourselves rather than fitting in to get along with others.

The Signature of all Things by Elizabeth Gilbert - Fabulous treatise on privilege and understanding the opportunities that are given to us enough to make meaningful use of them. Looks at the synchronicity of ideas and the freedom we all have to engage in thoughtful work/study once our basic needs are met.

My Life on the Road by Gloria Steinem - Such a wonderful history of organising for social change - learnt the value of talking circles and lots of history of the feminist movement in USA. Glorious!

The Last Painting of Sara De Vos by Dominic Smith - Great to read near How to be Both - common theme of women in art, the struggle with patriarchal societies. Effortlessly flips through three different time frames 1630s in Amsterdam, 1950s in New York and 2000 in Sydney featuring three main characters Hollander- Sara de Vos, American - Marty de Groot and Australian - Ellie Shipley.

The Enchanted by Rene Denfeld - Life on death row through the eyes of a few - an inmate, the warden and the lady investigator. Fascinating insights into the mind and human condition.

The Mermaids Singing by Val Mc Dermid - Unputdownable, kept reading until it was finished. Have read many of Val's books over the years, but this is the one that introduces us to Tony Hill and the fascinating business of profiling in serial murder investigations.

The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante - Book two in the series - I think the urge to keep reading comes from the thrill of ordinary lives made magical by the writing or perhaps it's the compulsion Elena has for the magnetism of Lila. Maybe we all remember a time when we were completely in thrall to another or it could be a reflection of those intense teenage friendships when the hormones are surging and the brain is frantically trying to make sense of the world while the spirit is struggling for independence from family and drudgery.

Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell - Fabulously interesting, fabulously informative. Malcolm busts the notion that success is a result of a single individuals relentless determination and work, instead he gives us research that leads us to realise that opportunity and legacy also have a big part to play. This is the first of his books I have read, the language he uses is so accessible that I can easily re-explain the concepts he develops.

The Most Good You Can Do by Peter Singer - An argument for Effective Altruism made in a logical, reasonable way, illustrated with real life stories and practical recommendations. Made me commit to being vegetarian.

Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf - Short sweet story about the rewards that come with age and no longer giving a fuck about how others judge you. Hated the ending though when she lets her son blackmail her into living her life the ways he wants her to, because the little controlling arsehole hasn't found the resilience to overcome his childhood trauma. But that's motherlove for you.

Bruno Chief Of Police by Martin Walker - A French version of the Andrea Camilleri detective novels.

David & Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell - Exploring the reasons why the seemingly powerless can overcome giants.

The Known World by Edward P. Jones - Jones weaves a tapestry of slavery and race identity in the United States while cleverly jumping back and forth in time.

The Burial Rites by Hannah Kent - Amazing story of waiting for a death sentence in Iceland in the 1880s.

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell - Explains the nature of epidemics - Mavens, Connectors and Salespeople combined with The Stickiness Factor, The Power of Context and Content.

Beside Myself by Ann Morgan - Compelling read , what will these twin sisters do to each other next, will they reconcile, will they find success or love or answers?

Black Rock, White City by A.S. Patric - Brilliant tale of a Serb couple's adjustment to immigrant life in Melbourne. A look at how people don't dare probe too deeply into another's world fearing the depth of sorrow they may find.

Connect the dots

GOMA's 10th anniversary show Sugar Spin is filled with specially commissioned treasures and popular hits. Yesterday saw us thronging through Brisbane's cultural mecca and while the size of the exhibition makes it too hard to talk about all my favourites, I will focus on my favourite shape to work with - circles.

Yayoi Kusama is a woman after my own heart, Infinity nets is a gentle canvas of of white nets painted over a soft blue-white background. The girls looking at it said "Mum I bet you'd like to paint something like this" and they're right, I do find the continuous drawing of circles soothing. In Kusama's case the accompanying label tells us that "Suffering from 'rijin'sho', or depersonalisation syndrome, Kusama's art triggers visual experiences that metaphorically communicate the hallucinations, or veil of dots, she has endured since she was a child. This vibrant iconography, often transposed as nets or auras, dominates her practice." At 87 she is still churning out amazing work and generated the concept for another of GOMA's most popular participation pieces - The Obliteration Room.

Doreen Reid Nakamarra painted Untitled (Marrapinti) the year before she died at the early age of 54. When you stand back from this large canvas the surface seems to shimmer and ripple. I had to get up close to work out how she managed to create this amazing optical illusion, when I did I realised that what I had assumed to be zig-zag lines were in fact a series of dots. The gallery label explains "Dotted lines give an impression of waves of sand blowing across the landscape and the optical illusions born by the desert heat haze." The varying thickness of the pale zig-zags atop the darker background manages your visual perception so that you see triangular 3D shapes rising up, making this a fascinating piece to view.

Third and last entry in the circular category of favourites goes to Maraana Vamarasi, a weaver from Fiji. This incredibly beautiful large round mat is made from pandanus dyed black with mud. In Fiji round mats are called Ibe Nauri and this outsized creation sits majestically against the white walls of the gallery. The subtle variation in the colour of the dye brings a soothing sensation. The gallery comments on this also "The play of light across the dark surface of the mat, picks up the intricacy and the textured beauty of Vamarasi's skilled weaving."

It's so easy to be inspired by cultural events like Sugar Spin and it's a great way to jolt me into action for the coming year's projects. Happy New Year!

 

Bravery

“We are all born with this tremendous capacity to be anything” so says Phil Zimbardo psychologist and a professor emeritus at Stanford University. It’s an intriguing concept to explore and it has been Zimbardo’s mission to understand human impulses – to look at why we are how we are – why some cross the line between good and evil – why some are able to act heroically.

Hannah Arendt also put considerably effort into understanding our capacity for evil, particularly in analysing the rise of Nazi Germany. How is it that faced with the choice of collaborating to help your Jewish neighbours escape or giving them up to the regime, that so few took the higher path. Her conclusion chimes with Zimbardo’s – “all that is needed for evil to thrive is for good people to do nothing”. “Arendt called it the “Banality of Evil”, Zimbardo bouncing off her observations wants us to consider the opposite the “Banality of Heroism” – that we can be taught to resist our usual compulsion to be part of the herd. To this end he has instigated The Heroic Imagination Project (HIP).

HIP trains participants to become accustomed to standing out from the crowd – small acts like walking around the city dressed as a bunny. Most of us have been taught to mind our own business, to not get involved, Zimbardo says that consequently we will be “guilty of the evil of inaction… And you have to say, “Mama, humanity is my business.”

Fellow researcher, Stanley Milgram conducted his famously controversial experiment on Obedience to Authority in the 1960s, he quantified “evil as the willingness of people to blindly obey authority.” In response to this Zimbardo advises that “The key to heroism is two things:

A: you’ve got to act when other people are passive.

B: you have to act socio-centrically, not egocentrically.”

So how is it we become passive and ego-centric? Zimbardo has developed a hit list:

·      Dehumanization of others

·      De-individuation of Self

·      Diffusion of personal responsibility

·      Blind obedience to authority

·      Uncritical conformity to group norms

·      Passive tolerance to evil through inaction or indifference

All of which seem obvious when you think about it and you can see that when these acts are combined together they have the power to erode any inclination to action. That’s why it’s important to admire heroic acts – it takes bravery to be a whistle-blower, to save lives to disobey authority, to be non-conformist, to speak up, to take action. Zimbardo exhorts us to focus on the positive to “Advocate for respect of personal dignity, for justice and peace.” That sounds worthwhile.

Respect

I, Daniel Blake left me in despair. We have become a cruel society in our quest for efficiencies and measurable outputs. Ken Loach focuses his lens on the desperation felt by those of us down on our luck. The systems put in place by government agencies, insurance companies and other corporate giants seem designed to crush the human spirit. And not just the spirit of those accessing services, but also the compassionate nature of their employees, who are bound by rules and hounded by supervisors to tow the company line.

We used to have respect for people who were less fortunate, a “there but for the grace of god” feeling of regard. A seemingly forgotten, though important aspect of respect is the consideration for the feelings, wishes, and rights of others. This has been largely forfeited, replaced by the popular notion that if you work/study/strive/want it hard enough you will be magically rewarded. This idea of meritocracy is dangerous, it allows us to write people off as unworthy, a difficult stance to justify given the wealth distribution statistics. The Oxfam Davos report highlights that “The gap between rich and poor is reaching new extremes. Credit Suisse recently revealed that the richest 1% have now accumulated more wealth than the rest of the world put together… Meanwhile, the wealth owned by the bottom half of humanity has fallen by a trillion dollars in the past five years. This is just the latest evidence that today we live in a world with levels of inequality we may not have seen for over a century.”

Yet I still believe there is enough to go around, though flummoxed by the mechanisms required to make this happen. Surely we can strive to be a respectable society – it is not proper, nor decent that “62 people own the same as half the world”. Perhaps the solution is imminent, the start up world of digital enterprises promises a sharing economy which I hope we can embrace.

from ideas of tending...

At the Caboolture Regional Art Gallery, Judith Kentish spoke to us about her latest exhibition - from ideas of tending... It occurred to Jude that though she does not let her work as a nurse cross over into her art practice both disciplines share the principle of tending to something - be it people, materials or ideas.

Working in series allows a process of working out, when a creative act becomes too easy it indicates to her that it's over and time to explore another way to experiment by asking what happens if? Using ink is a slow process with minimal interference allowing the fluidity and staining of the medium to do its thing. "My action was to start the process, but the work finished itself."

The piece wool mound: a vigil is two piles of wool on the gallery floor with a wooden stool in between. When you lean into the space you can hear the sound of wool being teased, which alerts you to the difference in the wool piles - teased and unteased. Jude says "my work is performative, people just don't see me doing it." Yet in her video work ink drops: the viewing we see her hands carefully moving the ink on paper pieces from one pile to another. This careful tending of the luscious 600gsm paper is accompanied by the crunchy sound that the protective glassine sheets make when moved.

Her woven drops are long tubes that look like they could contain something but are too frail to manage. They throw lonely long shadows on the wall and are an interesting counterpoint to her inkfolds. I was mesmerised by these shroud-like, cloud-like fabrics pinned to the wall behind Jude as she listed the materials used in the seven bodies of work:

• cotton voile
• thread
• ink
• wool
• paper
• pins
• video

The gifted wool had been accumulating in her studio and the act of wrapping it up in the voile to move it out of the way gave Jude the inspiration to make the woolsacs. These sacs play with the slumping of wool, the weight of wool, lyrically described in the catalogue:

gravity, pooled
pillowedinto ink stained,
ponder
an invitation
a pond-shroud of description
embodied hints
cyphers
each fat and full

Judith Kentish: from ideas of tending
On Display: 3 September - 11 November 2016