“The artist’s life cannot be otherwise than full of conflicts, for two forces are at war within him [or her]—on the one hand, the common human longing for happiness, satisfaction and security in life, and on the other a ruthless passion for creation which may go so far as to override every personal desire … There are hardly any exceptions to the rule that a person must pay dearly for the divine gift of creative fire.” —Carl Jung Thank you, apoetreflects.

“The artist’s life cannot be otherwise than full of conflicts, for two forces are at war within him [or her]—on the one hand, the common human longing for happiness, satisfaction and security in life, and on the other a ruthless passion for creation which may go so far as to override every personal desire … There are hardly any exceptions to the rule that a person must pay dearly for the divine gift of creative fire.”

—Carl Jung

Thank you, apoetreflects.

“The concept of the unconscious posits nothing; it designates only my unknowing.”

—C.G. Jung, from a letter to Pastor Max Frischkeit dated 8 February 1946.

Thank you, touba.

Ask a Question that Cannot Be Formulated

“Self-knowledge leads to wonder, and wonder to curiosity and investigation, so that nothing interests people more than people, even if only one’s own person. Every intelligent individual wants to know what makes him tick, and yet is fascinated and frustrated by the fact that oneself is the most difficult of all things to know.

The people we are tempted to call clods and boors are just those who seem to find nothing fascinating in being human; their humanity is incomplete, for it has never astonished them. There is also something incomplete about those who find nothing fascinating in being. You may say that this is a philosopher’s professional prejudice - that people are defective who lack a sense of the metaphysical. But anyone who thinks at all must be a philosopher - a good one or a bad one - because it is impossible to think without premises, without basic (and in this sense, metaphysical) assumptions about what is sensible, what is the good life, what is beauty, and what is pleasure. To hold such assumptions, consciously or unconsciously, is to philosophize.

I find it almost impossible to imagine a sensitive human being bereft of metaphysical wonder; a person who does not have that marvelous urge to ask a question that cannot be formulated.”

—Alan Watts, The Book on The Taboo against knowing who you are.

Courtesy of Whiskey River.

parabola-magazine: Only 5 more hours to place a bid at the online Parabola Holiday Auction! Brian English “Sacred Lotus IV.” 16”x20” Toned Gelatin Silver Print. Edition of 25. Signed. Brian English is an acclaimed photographer who has worked with Robert Mapplethorpe, Richard Avedon, Horst P. Horst, Annie Liebowitz, Herb Ritts, and others. He currently works as an arts administrator at the Herb Ritts Foundation in Los Angeles, and continues to create and exhibit his photographs.

parabola-magazine:

Only 5 more hours to place a bid at the online Parabola Holiday Auction!

Brian English “Sacred Lotus IV.” 16”x20” Toned Gelatin Silver Print. Edition of 25. Signed.

Brian English is an acclaimed photographer who has worked with Robert Mapplethorpe, Richard Avedon, Horst P. Horst, Annie Liebowitz, Herb Ritts, and others. He currently works as an arts administrator at the Herb Ritts Foundation in Los Angeles, and continues to create and exhibit his photographs.

The soil in which the meditative mind can begin is the soil of everyday life, the strife, the pain, and the fleeting joy. It must begin there, and bring order, and from there move endlessly. But if you are concerned only with making order, then that very order will bring about its own limitation, and the mind will be its prisoner. In all this movement you must somehow begin from the other end, from the other shore, and not always be concerned with this shore or how to cross the river. You must take a plunge into the water, not knowing how to swim. And the beauty of meditation is that you never know where you are, where you are going, what the end is.
Jiddu Krishnamurti (Yes, Thank you, apoetreflects)

(via apoetreflects)

Eliot Porter. Thank you, invisiblestories.

Eliot Porter. Thank you, invisiblestories.

Questlove | “Goodbye Isaac” (Thank you, theantidote, influent & tonysojka)

To Take a Step Without Feet

This is love: to fly toward a secret sky,
to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment.
First, to let go of live.
In the end, to take a step without feet.
To regard this world as invisible,
and to disregard what appears to the self.

Heart, I said, what a gift it has been
to enter this circle of lovers,
to see beyond seeing itself,
to reach and feel within the breast.

My soul, where does this breathing arise?
How does this beating heart exist?
Bird of the soul, speak in your own words,
and I will understand.

The heart replied: I was in the workplace
the day this house of water and clay was fired.
I was already fleeing that created house,
even as it was being created.
When I could no longer resist, I was dragged down,
and my features were molded from a handful of earth.

—Rumi, translated by Kabir Helminski [The Rumi Collection, Shambhala Publications, 2005]

Thank you, Memory Green

A tremendously amazing film.

Thank you, billyjane:

So I watched Wim Wenders’ Pina last night at FAF [Auteur Film Festival] and it was utterly sad and beautiful to see all those people she influenced and helped them to bring out the best in them to the stage… Do watch it in 3D if you have a chance….

Lilies in the Valley by Jun Miyake

 from Pina OST, 2011

Rodney Smith, Caroline Painting from Behind. Thank you, artemisdreaming.

Rodney Smith, Caroline Painting from Behind. Thank you, artemisdreaming.