FOUNDATION OF MINDFULNESS

I really like the way Buddhist thought applies to Transparent Drawing.  In the Seven Factors of Awakening, Buddhism has primary goals of integration, holism, complete understanding, renunciation of petty facets of the real world, etc.  And these are our goals.  So it is this similarity which I find inspirational and indeed a path to explore and follow.

So I thought I would have fun by taking a few passages from the book Beyond Mindfulness, and then modify those passages to accommodate the vocabulary of Transparent Drawing.  By definition, I am plagiarizing, as I am using more of the word sequence of the author than I am allowed to.  Yet with this approach, I am trying to honor the essence of Buddhism while substituting key terms of belief with equally key terms of Transparent Drawing.  In many of the Buddist texts that I read, there can be a convoluted quality to the explanation.  Yet with a re-reading or two, the concept can become clear.

Pay mindful attention to what you are drawing and leave your representational concerns behind while you are doing it.  (Generally, the basis for this text is found around page 132.)

When drawing each object, you must remain ardent, alert and mindful, putting aside any false concerns of representational accuracy.

You start out by looking at photographs of a physical object.  Then you shut your eyes and bring the complete object to mind as a visual image.  Eventually the object becomes entirely understood when you attend to it with eyes shut.  It is as clear as when you look at it with eyes open.  This is your learning sign.  You then draw the learning sign by striking at it over and over with applied thought and maintaining it with sustained thought.  As you draw, your knowledge then turns into something more subtle, like an after-image.  Your drawing becomes the counterpart sign.  As you draw in this way, your concentration grows in strength as representational hindrances are removed.

When you concentrate on an object before you draw, you investigate it, wordlessly looking for the impermanence.  As you discover impermanence, and pay more mindful attention to this new object, you will see it as unsatisfactory and without self.  Is any object permanent and solid?  The answer is “no.”  Then you ask yourself, where can I find something permanent in this Spacetime, with it’s perceptions, understandings and consciousness?  The answer will be “nowhere.”

Concentration holds an object before knowledge.  Knowledge then pays close attention to it.  Then investigation finds that it is constantly changing, thus showing the signs of unsatisfactoriness and representation.

This investigation arouses your energy to find the holistic while you push away anything false.

When practicing this mindfulness of knowledge and understanding, you develop a compassion for what you are drawing, and you then appreciate whatever is on your paper.

When you establish a joy toward complete knowledge, you mind becomes calm, relaxed and peaceful.  Delusion is dispelled  You no longer feel the burning of representation.   There is a sense of peace and happiness.

Once you can see and understand all of the components, equanimity arises.  Your mind understands the subject with equanimity.  Good or bad, proportioned or not, it is all the same.  It is knowledge-ness.

This is too easy.  I could go on for ever.  Yet, possibly, the above statements don’t make all that much sense to you?  If so, I am sorry.  Many, many Buddhist texts have a very convoluted language about them that at times you wonder what they are really talking about.   Many of the passages have what I call a circular meaning:  they have a tendency to come back onto themselves as they labor to describe a precept.

Yet I am having fun mapping Buddist thought onto Transparent Drawing.  We have had a couple of pages so far using Buddhism as a starting point:  Second Door Of Liberation and One Line One Wash.   This page is another.

With a bit more seriousness, I am continually amazed by the trajectory of Buddhism to what is called a formlessness.  They speak of the void.  An ultimate goal is for hindrances to be removed.  They speak of boundless space.  Not that any of this is achieved here.   Yet this trajectory is the superordinate meaning of what amounts to nothing more, and nothing less, than complete, holistic knowledge.  Possibly the drawing above captures some of this energy and knowledge.

1. Gunaratana, Bhante Henbepola. Beyond Mindfulness In Plain English. Wisdom Publications: Boston. 2009.