My First Blog
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Living Zen
I'm reading a book about Zen. It's Nothing Special: Living Zen by Charlotte Joko Beck. It was recommended to me by one of my coworkers. Well now he's an ex-coworkers because he needed to sail with Flag Ship Studio. Anyway, he said that his life was influenced by the ideas in this book. Now, this guy isn't much of a hippy so I was interested in what he saw in Zen.
I'm not done reading yet, but it's very interesting. I'm curious about the Zen. I didn't know exactly what it was before. I thought it was a religion, but it's more of a philosophy of life that is compatible with many religions. They are fascinated with sitting. They spend years sitting. I always thought they tried to empty their mind and relax when sitting, but it's actually quite the opposite. They sit to think about the problems in their life. Sitting allows them to critical analyzes their life and plan what do to in the future. I spend a lot of time walking and doing the same thing. I think they'd all be in better shape if they walked and thought rather than sat to think.
The book is full of metaphors. Life is like a river and we are all whirlpools in it. Sometimes trash flows down the river and ends up in your whirlpool. It swirls around in it for a while and then moves one. It's important the your whirlpool isn't stagnant because then it will be gross and grow algae. I'm not really sure what this metaphor is trying to say, but I think I like it. Maybe it's saying we should be hard-skinned and go with the flow. Well that's easy. Maybe I can be a Zenner.
We all have baseboards. This metaphor kinda lost me, but it seems important. Apparently when we are having problems we plug into our baseboards, kind of like pulling in a lamp. When a young child has a problem, he might through a temper tantrum. This is just him plugging in. It's a way to deal with an uncomfortable situation. Once you're a good sitter you learn to use your baseboard less and this is a really good thing. I believe the idea is that you shouldn't use a pre-canned emotion to deal with a situation. You should sit and think about it before you do anything.
The goal of being Zen isn't what I though it was. It's not about being peaceful and bliss. It's not supposed to be fun or comfortable. It's supposed to be joyful. You get joy by bringing harmony and growth to everyone. If you are in a situation that is a little uncomfortable for you but it brings harmony to others then you are doing well. You are suppose to find jobs, relationships, and everything that maximizes the amount of harmony and growth you can give to others.
Does anyone that's reading this blog know more about Zen than I? Am I getting it right? I'm not quite sure what harmony is. Hopefully this book will tell me. Anyway I'm enjoying the book. It's very well written and it is teaching me about something that I know very little. Owmmmmmmm...Owmmmmmm...
Monday, February 21, 2005
Living Zen
I'm reading a book about Zen. It's Nothing Special: Living Zen by Charlotte Joko Beck. It was recommended to me by one of my coworkers. Well now he's an ex-coworkers because he needed to sail with Flag Ship Studio. Anyway, he said that his life was influenced by the ideas in this book. Now, this guy isn't much of a hippy so I was interested in what he saw in Zen.
I'm not done reading yet, but it's very interesting. I'm curious about the Zen. I didn't know exactly what it was before. I thought it was a religion, but it's more of a philosophy of life that is compatible with many religions. They are fascinated with sitting. They spend years sitting. I always thought they tried to empty their mind and relax when sitting, but it's actually quite the opposite. They sit to think about the problems in their life. Sitting allows them to critical analyzes their life and plan what do to in the future. I spend a lot of time walking and doing the same thing. I think they'd all be in better shape if they walked and thought rather than sat to think.
The book is full of metaphors. Life is like a river and we are all whirlpools in it. Sometimes trash flows down the river and ends up in your whirlpool. It swirls around in it for a while and then moves one. It's important the your whirlpool isn't stagnant because then it will be gross and grow algae. I'm not really sure what this metaphor is trying to say, but I think I like it. Maybe it's saying we should be hard-skinned and go with the flow. Well that's easy. Maybe I can be a Zenner.
We all have baseboards. This metaphor kinda lost me, but it seems important. Apparently when we are having problems we plug into our baseboards, kind of like pulling in a lamp. When a young child has a problem, he might through a temper tantrum. This is just him plugging in. It's a way to deal with an uncomfortable situation. Once you're a good sitter you learn to use your baseboard less and this is a really good thing. I believe the idea is that you shouldn't use a pre-canned emotion to deal with a situation. You should sit and think about it before you do anything.
The goal of being Zen isn't what I though it was. It's not about being peaceful and bliss. It's not supposed to be fun or comfortable. It's supposed to be joyful. You get joy by bringing harmony and growth to everyone. If you are in a situation that is a little uncomfortable for you but it brings harmony to others then you are doing well. You are suppose to find jobs, relationships, and everything that maximizes the amount of harmony and growth you can give to others.
Does anyone that's reading this blog know more about Zen than I? Am I getting it right? I'm not quite sure what harmony is. Hopefully this book will tell me. Anyway I'm enjoying the book. It's very well written and it is teaching me about something that I know very little. Owmmmmmmm...Owmmmmmm...
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Test: Is This Fine Art?
I did a little photography project yesterday. I look a picture of some tulips with a water splat:
Do you like it?
I showed this picture to my friend, Calvin, and he was impressed. It took him a while to figure out exactly what he was looking at. And he ask me how I got the water to do that. I told him that I threw the water in the air with a table spoon measure and took the picture. Well, actually I ending up throwing about two cups of water one tablespoon at a time and took about 220 photographs. This picture is two of them Photoshopped together.
Do you still like this picture?
Can I use Photoshop? Is that ok? I don't think it is. Even though Calvin is a pretty liberal guy, he was offended at the use of Photoshop to digitally manipulate a scene. There is just something wrong with Photoshop. It's like cheating. It's not real. You can't make art with Photoshop.
I was actually delighted to hear Calvin say that. I makes me feel a little more like an artist. You see, just last week I went to the Roy Lichtenstein exhibit at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. You know, the guy that did the comic book type pictures:
I didn't like Roy Lichtenstein's work before I saw his exhibit. It didn't really look like fine art to me. At the exhibit I saw lots more of his pictures and learn about his motives. I'm not going to explain it all here, but it's definitely worth your time to go to an exhibit or read a book about him. He's one of my favorite artists now.
One of the things that makes Lichtenstein a great artist is that when you first look at his work you quickly dismiss it. I'm not totally sure why, but this is key characteristic in good fine art. This leads to "Tod's Rule To Understand Fine Art":
If you like a picture the first time you see it, it's probably not fine art.
Most now accepted modern fine artist's work was originally not well liked. Picasso is a perfect example. Only after his death did people fully appreciate his work. So that's why I was delighted to hear that Calvin didn't accept my picture. It makes me feel like I'm going in the right direction with my photography towards making fine art.
I have a prediction to make for you aspiring artists out there. The big fine art movement of this decade is going to be Photoshopped works. So take your work and manipulate it with Photoshop to offend the people. Then after you die, your work will be appreciated. (And if it isn't, you won't know because you are dead.)
Ok, back to my photo. Does anyone else out there take pictures of water? I have some technical problems. I first tried dropping the water and I couldn't get it not have motion blur. I exposed the shot for 1/8000 of a second, but it still blurred just a little which totally wrecked the image. So I started throwing the water and taking the picture at the top of the arc. This works ok but it really inconsistent. I need a way to throw a table spoon of water and have it stay together and hit the top of it's arc in a reasonably consistent place. My thought is to use a garden hose and put the arc of water right where I want it. Then block the flow of water to shoot tablespoon sized chucks of water. I think this could work, but everything would get wet. Probably not a good idea to do that in my dinning room. My other thought is to use a flash. I'll probably try both of these ideas and see how they work out.
