What the *@#$ are we doing?!

Oh my... I wrote this a month ago when I was down and out in Sagada here... but it never posted!  I am reposting it now.

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I am pissed off.

A confluence of factors-- notably going hungry and watching just the right wrong movies have got me angry.

I downloaded the iTunes movie of the week last night. Mainly because it was only 99 cents, and partly because it was based on a comic book I read when I was a kid. The Punisher. To add to it, the last two nights I've watched some other movies in my hotel room. Taken and the one before that Never Back Down.

WHAT THE @#$@#?

What am I doing? What are we doing? What are we thinking? I am talking not just about myself here but about Humanity.

Each of these movies is a full out celebration of violence, vengeance and even torture. And we're not talking the bad guys in the movie doing it-- we're talking the good guys. Half the movie is composed of human beings hurting and killing each other. Millions of dollars goes into making these Hollywood movies. Millions of people watch them and get ideas.

Don't we realize that by celebrating stories, characters and mode of being like this we are simply perpetuating this in the real world? Don't the directors know that by showing some innovative way of torturing someone, someone, somewhere is going to be inspired and do the same thing. Don't the actors-- the artists-- making these creations realize that their wonderful performances means that others, in real life, will imitate? Don't they realize that they make it just a little bit easier and more readily having seen it sanctified on the silver screen.

Imagine if you were an alien. No really-- Imagine.

Imagine you came down to Earth and you saw what type of stuff we watch and pay money to make and see. You'd shake your tentacled head. What are these humans doing? What are these artists and creators doing? Are they not conscious?

Like those movie directors, like those actors, I am an artist.

And here I am, doing my work, my movies and my art. I am working hard. I am putting all my skills and education and talents to use into another mode of art. And I am just barely surviving. I am struggling here to make money and keep myself eating while millions of dollars go to these other insane creations.

Yes... I am intensely aware that I have put myself in this place and predicament. I've been reflecting on this for the last few weeks in this peaceful village. I am reflecting on how my deep rooted patterns, values and ideologies-- many of which are ancient cultural relics-- hold me back from prosperously doing what I am doing. A big part of it is simply being convinced that my work and calling is worthy of asking sustenance for. It is simple as that, but, when you grow up in a world drenched in these values (like having read the Punisher comic books when I was a kid) it is hard to attain that particular confidence in a completely opposing way of doing things.

But no more.

Here we are doing this project-- the 1Mandala-- it is motivated not by violence, vengeance, profit, or anything else fear based. It is loved based-- the motivation is to find harmony, beauty and symphony. It doesn't protest conflict or war. It simply trascends it. It is the type of process and activity that simply is peace. No matter how convincing the special effects, you can't be fighting or warring to peace. There is no way around it.

And it all starts with art and ideas.

A good friend sent me a quotation the other day. She said it reminded her of my art:

"Art during the middle ages was communal, unindividualistic; it came out of a group consciousness. It was without the driving painful individuality of the art of the bourgeouis era. And one day we will leave behind the driving egotism of individual art. We will return to an art which will express not man's self-divisions and separateness from his fellows, but his responsibility for his fellows and his brotherhood."

Time for the shift. Support my work here:

Www.1Mandala.org/1prints

Or:

Www.1Mandala.org/1portrait