Opening Our Minds and Our Eyes to Potential
I have long been intrigued by what painters call negative space which, as I understand it, is the space which is not painted or is not part of the image which is being portrayed. There are many famous examples of what happens to the image when one focuses on the negative space instead of the intended image. Then the negative space becomes the positive space and vice versa.
Jo Ellen Parker, the new president of Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh says that one of her most prized possession is “The Gift," a four foot-high sculpture of a Buddhist monk holding an empty space between outstretched hands. “The space he offers – the gift he carries – is pure potential.” explains Ms. Parker (quoted in the Fall 2014 Carnegie Magazine).
Eckhart Tolle talks about the space between words; about the goal of being present to the person or situation without attending to the content of the words. He calls this space consciousness.
Still others talk about learning to be present to the moment in an open way without the restrictions of labels. As soon as we label something, a person or a situation, we limit our experience. I once attended a weekend spiritual retreat with about 30 other people – all males. None of us had previously met each other. The assignment was to get to know each other without revealing age, education, type of work or career, ethnic background, cultural background, sexual orientation, health status (other than something one could not hide such as loss of limb or being in wheelchair), roles such as father, partner, husband, son or any of the other labels we usually exchange with each other when we first meet. This was quite a challenge and, yet, by the end of the weekend we felt as if many of us had gotten quite well acquainted.
Certainly, I am not suggesting that we could function without any labels. I am, however, suggesting that if I want to grow spiritually I have to be less dependent on the labels to tell me how to experience a person or a situation. Often an artist such as the Chilean artist, Sebastian Errazuriz, sees an ordinary object morphing into a completely different object. For example he takes a stuffed duck and creates a flexible lamp. I suppose one could say that all creative people nurture their ability or their willingness to focus on what is not said, hinted at, or portrayed.
Whether we are starting over because of a divorce, the loss of a career, a change in our health, or because we need to find a more effective way of functioning, we have to be willing to take what the philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard, calls the leap of faith. There is an exercise which I sometimes invite others who are "stuck" to try. I ask them to close their eyes and scribble on a piece of paper until they are done. Then when they open their eyes, I ask them to quickly outline with a colored crayon whatever lines stand out. Next, just as quickly I ask them to give the new object a title. 100% of the time the object which stands out is representative of something which is unconsciously going on with the person. We have to temporarily suspend our defensive judgments and labels and be willing to be open to what we are experiencing.
The space between the hands is, in my experience, what we have to open to if we are going to find what is possible. We already know how to limit ourselves, how to run from ourselves or a situation, or how to react in fear. I wonder what would happen if we spent even five minutes a day being open to the potential in ourselves, another person or a situation; even, for example, the positive potential in someone I have labeled as my enemy. I am reminded of Mother Theresa suggesting that if we want to see God to look at those we have labeled the unlovable, for example the tough looking, tattooed, man in prison for murdering another, the person who has sexually abused a child, the often hurtful, bumbling, ineffective human that I am. How is this possible one might ask? We have to see the potential of what appears to be not there - the negative space.
I have long been intrigued by what painters call negative space which, as I understand it, is the space which is not painted or is not part of the image which is being portrayed. There are many famous examples of what happens to the image when one focuses on the negative space instead of the intended image. Then the negative space becomes the positive space and vice versa.
Jo Ellen Parker, the new president of Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh says that one of her most prized possession is “The Gift," a four foot-high sculpture of a Buddhist monk holding an empty space between outstretched hands. “The space he offers – the gift he carries – is pure potential.” explains Ms. Parker (quoted in the Fall 2014 Carnegie Magazine).
Eckhart Tolle talks about the space between words; about the goal of being present to the person or situation without attending to the content of the words. He calls this space consciousness.
Still others talk about learning to be present to the moment in an open way without the restrictions of labels. As soon as we label something, a person or a situation, we limit our experience. I once attended a weekend spiritual retreat with about 30 other people – all males. None of us had previously met each other. The assignment was to get to know each other without revealing age, education, type of work or career, ethnic background, cultural background, sexual orientation, health status (other than something one could not hide such as loss of limb or being in wheelchair), roles such as father, partner, husband, son or any of the other labels we usually exchange with each other when we first meet. This was quite a challenge and, yet, by the end of the weekend we felt as if many of us had gotten quite well acquainted.
Certainly, I am not suggesting that we could function without any labels. I am, however, suggesting that if I want to grow spiritually I have to be less dependent on the labels to tell me how to experience a person or a situation. Often an artist such as the Chilean artist, Sebastian Errazuriz, sees an ordinary object morphing into a completely different object. For example he takes a stuffed duck and creates a flexible lamp. I suppose one could say that all creative people nurture their ability or their willingness to focus on what is not said, hinted at, or portrayed.
Whether we are starting over because of a divorce, the loss of a career, a change in our health, or because we need to find a more effective way of functioning, we have to be willing to take what the philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard, calls the leap of faith. There is an exercise which I sometimes invite others who are "stuck" to try. I ask them to close their eyes and scribble on a piece of paper until they are done. Then when they open their eyes, I ask them to quickly outline with a colored crayon whatever lines stand out. Next, just as quickly I ask them to give the new object a title. 100% of the time the object which stands out is representative of something which is unconsciously going on with the person. We have to temporarily suspend our defensive judgments and labels and be willing to be open to what we are experiencing.
The space between the hands is, in my experience, what we have to open to if we are going to find what is possible. We already know how to limit ourselves, how to run from ourselves or a situation, or how to react in fear. I wonder what would happen if we spent even five minutes a day being open to the potential in ourselves, another person or a situation; even, for example, the positive potential in someone I have labeled as my enemy. I am reminded of Mother Theresa suggesting that if we want to see God to look at those we have labeled the unlovable, for example the tough looking, tattooed, man in prison for murdering another, the person who has sexually abused a child, the often hurtful, bumbling, ineffective human that I am. How is this possible one might ask? We have to see the potential of what appears to be not there - the negative space.
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