Less Alone

What is art?

Isn't it interesting to watch how when a question comes to mind, the universe swings around to provide you with all you need to find the answer....


Air travel picks you up by the scruff of the neck, out of one familiar life and plonks you down into a completely fresh environment. It's like someone giving you a second chance.

Here you go, new place, new culture, new people. What are you gonna to do about it?

Can you adapt and mould?

Or does the mind require the external to re-form around IT?

In other words, being somewhere new can shine a light on how stuck you are.

It is fasinating to watch the whole thing going on.

Your external persona as it adapts to the new world it finds itself in. And then to be, at the same time, aware of the parallel reality of the mind. That one that is still playing out old habit patterns.

How much of the mind is affecting your behaviour?

How much is conditioned?

How much is spontaneous?

In the moments of space, of moment to moment, beauty floods in, or should I say out....?

Everything seems to be art.

It could be the way a grubby old silversmith's hat hangs...


It could be the colour of the ropes or the fold of a sail...


It could be the way the frangipani had been placed, just under the pillow...


Or, as Mozambique presents the natural world so easily, the froth of the waves on the seashore...


The shadow hiding in the heel....


The sun lighting up the leaves...


Or edges around a cloud....



Are these things art or merely a subjective observation of the beauty that is around us? A subjectivity that is changing, like a person does, from moment to moment, from day to day, from week to week?

Is photography art or skill?

Does a cushion become an art form if it is framed in a rectangle and 'click', photographed in a particular way?



Art is said to be a vehicle for the expression or communication of emotions or ideas. Perhaps this is the purpose of art?

Krishanmurti suggests, in relation to meditation that, "One sense of the word 'art' is to put everything in its right place, so that there is no confusion."

Van Gogh said, "I did not paint it as I saw it, I drew it as I saw the spirit in it."

And along the same lines, my grandfather once wrote that art is, "a manifestation of God throught he agency of man."

Sitting on the plane, destined for Jo-burg, I was flicking through Time Magazine where I found a definition that made sense to me....


"Art is whatever makes you feel less alone." Meg Ryan

If, indeed, artists communicate the universal spirit, it only follows that when we see that art, we feel more joined, more united and so......less alone.

Mask

Women on Vamizi Island have been painting their faces in a white cream for centuries.

This is known as muciro face painting.


The cream is extracted from an indigenous plant called Kipalo which is cut in the bush, and left to dry in the sun for five days. It is then crushed on a stone with a little water and applied to the face with help of a traditional brush hand made from coconut fibre.

Here on Vamizi space is made for this special rictual.


The mask is usually applied in the morning at around 5am and removed only after the sun has set.

It shows up better on black faces rather than white, but it was a good excuse to chat with the local women. Women around the world always find something to talk about, even if only in sign language..


Tradition goes that women about to wed should always use a muciro face mask to signal their purity and virginity, and to keep their skin soft and healthy.

These days many women of all ages use the paste as a beauty routine.


My skin felt good after I took off the mask.

Better than Clinique perhaps....?

Less Ordinary

"Meditation is not an escape. It is not something mysterious. Out of meditation comes a life that is holy, a life that is sacred. And therefore you treat all things as sacred."
KRISHNAMURTI
This Light In Oneself

How?

"There is only one question: How to love this world?"
MARY OLIVER

Action in Consciousness

As we move to subtler Koshas, ALL ACTION TAKES PLACE IN CONSCIOUSNESS.


Let me simplify things by making some suggestions about action in each of the five Koshas:

Annamaya Kosha, the physical body: Nourish and respect your body. Appreciate its incredible inner intelligence. Do not fear it or taint it with toxins. Take time to really be in your body. Take it outside and let it play!


Pranamaya Kosha, the vital body: Go out into Nature and sink into the feeling that this is your home. Respect and nourish the ecosystem. Do not harm other living things. See Nature without fear or hostility. Reverence for life is the key here.


Manomaya Kosha, the mental body: Develop positive uses of the mind. Read and appreciate what is finest in human expression. Become aware that you are a wholeness, and allow ideas to come in that support wholeness over separation. Resist us-versus-them thinking. Examine your automatic reactions and secondhand beliefs. Find every opportunity to welcome signals from your higher self.


Vigyanmaya Kosha, the ego body: Find a vision; go on a quest. Fit yourself into the larger pattern of growth. Seek ways to evolve personally. Celebrate the vast traditions of spirit and wisdom that unite cultures. Be as humane as you can in every way, following the dictum "The world is my family."


Anandamaya Kosha, the body of bliss: Develop your own practice for transcending and finding bliss. You already know the phrase "Follow your bliss"; now put it into practice through some kind of "alpha wave" exercise like meditation and deep relaxation. Devote yourself to discovering what Samadhi, the silence of deep awareness, is really like.

Experience your own being as a reason to be here.



DEEPAK CHOPRA
Life After Death

Have Love, Will Travel

24 years of travel to Africa finds me continually impressed by how vibrant, energetic and open the people are - especially when it comes to music. They’re just there, doing it, in it, with a natural rhythm and swing.

Vamizi Island, Northern Mozambique, is no exception.


Vamizi threw my mind out of its familiar, monotonous, grooves by its sheer beauty.


Vamizi is completely unspoilt and has a special vibration.


Palm trees sway in the wind; the turquoise sea shimmers and heals. The blue sky reflects something deeper and the white, soft sand is home to a whole world of shells and sea creatures.


Vamizi is a true Robinson Crusoe hideaway. I lay awake listening to the soft snoring of Barbara, an excitable but completely lovable (Italian) room mate, as my fantasies turned from Robert Reford to Man Friday...

Vamizi isn’t a cliché, it isn’t just a picture postcard.


Travelling to Africa as a Product Manager of a well-established travel company, you carry a price tag. There are expectations to fulfil. With potential business to offer it goes without saying that everybody is interested to know you. The red carpet is rolled out (sometimes literally), taps are polished, food is prepared with extra care and smiles are set to impress.

In other words, to begin with there is an agenda. Everybody has their roles. The boxes have to be ticked. Contracts exchanged and then hopefully a flow of tourists and money is set up from developed to developing, from north to south, from richer to poorer. Efforts are being made to redistribute wealth and this 'trickle down' effect can be clearly seen on Vamizi.

But, almost without exception, relationships develop beyond this. Friendships are formed and a genuine interest in Africa, its culture and its wildlife is shared.


Music is just one way to dissolve these roles and time and time again i've seen it form a firm bridge between cultures.

As we walked into Vamizi Village, the villagers were there to meet us. There was a buzz in the air. White smiles in black faces greeted us as the children rushed forward to present us with fresh coconuts to drink from.


The music started....


A circle formed and we watched as hips swayed, hands clapped and the sheer exuberance for life burst over. What I liked about the atmosphere is that these guys were enjoying themselves regardless of our presence. We were just an excuse.


These villagers had seen tourists coming in before. Maybe spending a lot of time with cameras held up to their eyes? Smiling a little awkwardly perhaps and then leaving?

So often our conditioning holds us back. I know because i've suffered the pain of constraint many times. The result is that so often in these sort of situations the sharing of music is one sided.


However, thankfully this time around Ganesha (the Hindu elephant God of happiness) came to the rescue.

The tune seemed to be a hit and people picked it up quickly. (Check the woman with the yellow scarf wrapped around her head and the nice body moves..).



With the expanding process of globalisation, I feel it is becoming more and more essential to share that part of our self that is universal. To shift our attention from outer appearance and language, which serves only to divide, and to move further towards the thing that unites.


Music is one of the many vehicles that we have at our disposal to express, what has the potential to be, our purest feeling.

As the chocolaty voice of Nat King Cole suggests............


“Love Is The Thing.”

Stay Young

"He has a sort of bottomless capacity for wonder. The magic of history, of the cosmos, of words and of love keep him rapt. He is at their mercy the way a poet is. All that wonder keeps him happy and humble and wide-eyed."
MEG RYAN on TOM HANKS