Painting is a meditative act where we are often able to lose ourselves in the process of creation. Other types of meditation help me stimulate creativity and lose myself so I am able to find myself—the self that makes me feel most alive. Listening to what emerges in silence can have a profound effect on your paintings and life. As Adrian Calabrese says, “When you have achieved a state of deep meditation, you unlock the door to your subconscious mind. That is where your power to create the life you desire lies.”
When I finally began listening, my entire life shifted internally, career-wise and even geographically with an unexpected move across the country. One of my favorite ways to honor the sacred within me and around me is to welcome quiet and stillness into my daily life. Yoga and meditation allow me to feel deeply centered to expand to new possibilities and feel passionately alive.
One of my favorite simple breathing meditations uses the imagery of light and flowers to cleanse, heal and rejuvenate, which clears a space in your head and heart to create. I do this when I am feeling stuck while painting or in everyday life situations where I might be physically or emotionally drained.
A favorite meditation: Close your eyes and relax your body starting at the top of your head and consciously releasing any tension all the way to your toes. Then, imagine a light, your divine light, all around you. Breathe in. Imagine sending that love light into each cell in your body with your breath. Exhale the charcoal residue within. Feel cleansed and refreshed with each breath. Let go of anything that does not serve you. For example, breathe out fear, breathe in power. Breathe out anger, breathe in peace. Breathe out anxiety, breathe in confidence.
I continue my quiet reflection with Elizabeth Murray’s meditation from Living Life in Full Bloom: “Now imagine your heart and see any little cracks. Picture love coming down like liquid gold, pouring from the heavens to fill your heart, making it stronger and more beautiful with radiance. Imagine the flowering of all the love you have cultivated in your life blooming in your heart. Breathe into that. Envision love flowing like liquid gold into your heart from all the sources of nourishment in your life, strengthening it with an enormous, expanding capacity to hold more love, feel your heart bloom with flowers in profuse abundance.”
There is a voice within you that no one, not even you, has ever heard. Give yourself the opportunity of silence and begin to develop your listening in order to hear, deep within yourself, the music of your own spirit.
—John O’Donohue—
Inhale what you need and exhale what doesn’t serve you. Notice how this makes you feel. Are you more attuned to creative energy within and without? Working from a positive place is powerful and helps deflect any self-criticism and doubt.
I smile with inhale, flowers bloom in my heart.
—Elizabeth Murray—
Rose Tree
by Elizabeth Murray
I wanted to ask Elizabeth Murray some questions about meditation.
What does meditating mean to you?
Meditation can be anything that opens a channel to allow a clear flow for receiving. It is not just sitting with your eyes closed, although I do that sometimes. It can be taking a walk, ironing, cooking, watering your garden or sketching. Driving can be a meditation where we remain alert but focus our mind on something such as love. One of my favorite ways to meditate is by arranging fresh flowers, which allows me to quiet my mind and focus my awareness.
How can meditation help us tap into our creativity?
Personally, meditation helps me clear the clutter in my mind so inspiration can stream in. It is like driving on a clear road instead of in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Meditation clears the creative pathway for beauty to come in and find its way out.
What are some of your favorite ways to meditate?
I love to meditate with others. My good friends and I meditate every week on the phone together. We talk or sometimes we read something inspirational and then meditate in silence. I also meditate by myself in my garden and while doing mundane jobs around the house. Even chopping vegetables and making soup with love and creativity for my students is a meditation.
What does meditating look like to you? How can you incorporate daily meditation into your life? If you already meditate, can you try something new, such as meditating with a group or incorporating movement with a walking meditation?
While I walking on the beach at sunrise on New Year’s Day, the phrase “May the light shine on me and within me,” popped into my head as though my inner voice were sending me a message to be a giver and receiver of light. My friend Heather Pasqualino says that recently her intuitive voice has been repeating to her while she paints to “Let go,” and “Trust yourself.” What phrases or mantras pop into your head during the silence of meditating or creating that connect you with your divine center?
Today I stretch down my roots into the rich darkness, trusting that I have all I need to bloom. I will gradually seek the light, emerging and unfolding to my own fullness.
—Affirmation
by Elizabeth Murray—