To Inspire, Transform & Heal

Linda Wiggen Kraft
Creativity for the Soul

Creativity Journey #5  – Becoming One With Nature & Creative Flow

Creativity Journey #5  – Becoming One With Nature & Creative Flow

This creativity journey – Becoming One With Nature & Creative Flow – explores ways to awaken to our oneness with nature and creative flow through writing, mandalas and expressive drawing.

 

 

This Creativity Journey blog post (like the others)  is organized into five parts. Enjoy the Journey.
* The why, or big picture of creativity, what is our deep longing to connect with our creativity.
* A guided meditation to relax into a mind, body and heart space opening to creativity flow.
* Prompts for Dancing on Paper, mark making with words and images.
* Examples and how-to of mark making through the prompts.
* Closing Poem or Prayer.

(All Creativity Journey blog post lessons are found by clicking”#CreativityJourneys” in the categories section shown on the right side column of blog posts)

 

THE WHY OF NATURE CONNECTION
We are one with nature. Every part of our being and body is of the same elements and essence as all of nature, creation and the ever ongoing creating of the universe. Yet we often forget this and feel separate. When we connect with nature we awaken to, and become one with, that ever present creative flow of life.

 

“The universe is composed of subjects to be communed with, not objects to be exploited. Everything has its own voice.
Thunder and lightening and stars and planets, flowers, birds, animals, trees,
… all these have voices, and they constitute a community
of existence that is profoundly related.”

“…we will recover our sense of wonder and our sense of the sacred only if we appreciate the universe
beyond ourselves as a revelatory experience of that numinous presence whence all things came into being.
Indeed, the universe is the primary sacred reality.
We become sacred by our participation in this more sublime dimension
of the world about us.”
Father Thomas Berry

Father Thomas Berry was a eco-theologian, or geologian as he called himself,  whose work centered on awaking us to the sacredness and creative power of all creation. His many books and writings share his wisdom.

 

Rainbow spider web seen in a morning walk through my garden

 

Human consciousness is unique, yet not the only consciousness of all of creation. The rocks, the river, the animals, the plants all have a consciousness that allows experience. We can awaken to this by honoring of “beingness” of the world and cosmos that surrounds us.  The “beingness” of all physical and subtle matter includes our entire earth with mountains, deserts, rain forest, forests, oceans, lakes, rivers, trees, grasses, plants, soil, animals, birds, bees, feelings and on and on.

 

Bumble bee and celosia in my garden

For most of us, trees are part of our landscapes. They live in cities, suburbs and countryside. Right now the autumn colors astound us with their changes and brilliance. For those in springtime, the new greening is fresh and vibrant. Trees are beings with a life and consciousness of their own.

CHOOSE A TREE
This creativity journey is about connecting our hearts with the heart and essence of a tree.  Find a tree you can sit close to, or against, that will be your companion on this journey.  There may be a tree in your yard, a public park or a tree between the sidewalk and street.  If you can’t be outside with a tree, perhaps there is one close by a window where you can imagine sitting against or near.  Find a tree spot where you can spend perhaps an hour.

 

Mother Persimmon in my backyard

 

MY JOURNEY
I have shared life with an old native persimmon tree in my backyard for twenty nine years. I never shared my thoughts, feelings and admiration as deeply with this amazing tree as I did on this creativity journey.  I explored the shapes and movement of the bark and branches. I let my eyes and hands dance on the surfaces. I touched the skin of the tree and let the tree’s  essence touch my heart.

 

Persimmon bark reminds me of dragon scales

 

A red insect scales the deep textured mountains and valleys of the living moss and bark

 

YOUR JOURNEY
May this journey bring a new depth of connection and meaning to you, your tree and beyond.

 

Chair and art table set up outside

 

Art materials used: conté crayon, graphite colored pencil, Pilot parallel pen, technical pen with red ink, papers.

 

ART MATERIALS NEEDED
Paper to write and draw on. My 22.5 x 12 inch folder with newsprint, mixed media and lined school papers.

Opened 22.5 x 12 inch folder with finished writing, sketches and other papers.

 

Closed folder 7.5 x 12 inches.

 

For mark making I used soft lead pencils, conté crayons, writing pens, and pilot parallel pen 6.0 mm.  For gesture drawing something that is soft and gives a quick mark is best like crayons, conté crayons, charcoal or chalk pastels.

Conté crayons, and derwent green graphite pencil. Not shown – Pilot Parallel Pen 6.0 mm

 

GUIDED MEDITATION – Becoming one with nature and creative flow – 10 minutes, 35 seconds


  You may want to listen to this mediation before finding your tree, and/or listen to it when you have settled near the chosen tree.

 

PROMPTS FOR DANCING ON PAPER
This creativity journey is about really seeing and becoming one with what is seen.  This poem by John Moffitt says it best.

To Look at Any Thing
To look at any thing,

If you would know that thing,
You must look at it long:
To look at this green and say,
“I have seen spring in these
Woods,” will not do—you must
Be the thing you see:
You must be the dark snakes of
Stems and ferny plumes of leaves,
You must enter in
To the small silences between
The leaves,
You must take your time
And touch the very peace
They issue from.

    John Moffitt

 

WRITING PROMPT – TREE LOVE LETTER
Your tree may be a new friend you are just getting to know. Your tree may be an old friend like the one I chose. In either case, sit down and write a love letter to this tree.  Really look and feel. Open your heart to give your thoughts and feelings. Open your heart to hear the heart wood of the tree. Address the beingness of this tree. Look closely at its bark.  Look closely at the dance of the branches as they grow like antennas to the sky or ground gathering waves of energy from sky and soil into their center.

Make your letter personal. My tree I now call  Mother Persimmon. She gives fruit in September every year. Somewhere nearby there is a male persimmon that bees bring his pollen from. I don’t know where this tree is.  Mother Persimmon has a daughter who lives in my neighbor’s yard. She was planted as a seed by squirrels. That daughter shares her fruit later in October and November. Mother Persimmon also has female and male progeny growing in a nearby school’s outdoor classroom.

Male & female children of Mother Persimmon at a nearby school’s outdoor classroom

 

Mother Persimmon’s companions with their soft and hard textures.

 

I love the crooked branches and their staccato dance with the sky

 

My letter to Mother Persimmon was full of thanks, questions and love. I took the letter and held it to her bark and shared it with her. After that I took a large pencil and rubbed along the bark to get an imprint of her texture. Those texture marks felt like a gift from her to me.

 

TOUCHING YOUR TREE
Take the tree letter you wrote and read it, aloud or silent, to your tree.  Hold it against the trunk.  Make a rubbing of the bark onto your letter, leaving marks on the paper. These are exchanged gifts from you to the tree and back again.  Let your skin touch the skin of the tree.  Imagine all that touches the tree: squirrels running along the branches, birds stopping before flying off, moss growing on bark, rain touching all the branches and leaves,  sun light turning into food through the leaves, snow gently falling on bare branches, a red bug walking on the hills and valleys of the bark.

DRAWING & DANCING WITH THE BRANCHES
The connection of writing a love letter and touching your tree opens us up to truly seeing and drawing.

Gesture drawing. Gesture drawing is most often done with a human nude model who strikes different poses. These drawing of quick lines show the movement of a pose. Gesture drawing is fast, sometimes a minute or less. They are sketches that warm up seeing and dancing with lines on the paper. They are like practicing scales on a piano.

I love the movement of this large branch. It’s turns and angles are reminders of sometimes sharp turns and angles of life.

 

 

My first gesture drawings were done in conté crayon and green graphite colored pencil. I am not in love with these sketches, but they helped me see if the angles were what I was seeing. Sometimes they were and sometimes not.

 

One way to see if the angles are what you are drawing is to hold up a pencil aligning it with the angle of what you are drawing. Match that angle with what is drawn on paper.

The (blurred) pencil was held up to get the main angle of the branch.

 

I used a 6.0mm Pilot parallel pen for my last sketch. I love the line variation that accentuates the sharp angles of the branches.  The green leaves are the graphite colored pencil.

Ink sketch created with Pilot Parallel Pen 6.0 mm and green graphite pencil

 

 

PERSIMMON MANDALA
Nature mandalas are another way to honor a tree and nature’s gifts. Find fallen leaves, sticks and other on the ground gifts from nature. This persimmon mandala is created from the daughter tree’s fruit and persimmon leaves all ready fallen.

Looking closely at the leaves there is a beauty in the black marks and coloring. These leaves would most likely be overlooked in a collection of brightly colored fall leaves, but by looking closely and slowly their beauty is seen.

 

Like the sand mandalas created by Buddhist Monks that are swept up when finished and taken to a body of water, the persimmon mandala will go into the pile of nearby leaves and taken to a compost pile.

 

 

 

CLOSING POEM or  PRAYER

My favorite part of the poem “To Look at Any Thing”  by Tom Moffitt, deserves repetition.
(Entire poem in earlier part of this blog)

You must enter in
To the small silences between
The leaves,
You must take your time
And touch the very peace
They issue from.

 

Enjoy & Create

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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