“When someone is searching,” said Siddhartha, “then it might easily happen that the only thing his eyes still see is that what he searches for, that he is unable to find anything, to let anything enter his mind, because he always thinks of nothing but the object of his search, because he has a goal, because he is obsessed by the goal. Searching means: having a goal. But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal. You, oh venerable one, are perhaps indeed a searcher, because, striving for your goal, there are many things you don’t see, which are directly in front of your eyes.”
— Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
Do you know what its like to try too hard? I sure do. I remember one time back when I was a young adult. As a teenager, I collected coins tho I had long before given it up. One day I needed money and I remembered that I had one coin in my collection that was worth quite a bit to me in those days. I could easily bring it down to the collector’s shop and get around one hundred and fifty dollars for it. If only I could find it. I only had about an hour to get to the shop before it closed. I pulled out the cases that housed my collection and started rummaging through the collection. I kept digging through and digging through but I couldn’t find that one coin I knew that I had. I must have gone through hundred of coins of lesser value, ones that I would only get five to ten dollars apiece for but I needed that $150. I went searching for two hours and eventually found it tho the store had long since closed. . I then realized what I had been doing and I started laughing out of the sheer silly frustration of it all. I would have had more than enough money if I had only grabbed the coins of lesser value. Together they added up to way more than the one I sought.
It’s like that sometimes when we want something badly. We become so focused on what we want and how we are to go about getting it that we lose sight of all the smaller things that in the long run may benefit us even more. It would be much more useful if we remained open to what was in our path even as we worked toward our goals knowing that the whole of many small things combined can often be greater than the tunnel vision accomplishment of our set goal. I am not saying that we shouldn’t set our intent on goals but it helps if we remain open to what else lies in our path.
Blessings, G
“In my opinion to search means nothing in painting. To find is the thing. Nobody is interested in following a man who, with his eyes fixed on the ground, spends his life looking for the pocketbook that fortune should put in “his path. The one who finds something … , even if his intention were not to search for it, at least arouses our curiosity, if not our admiration … .
When I paint, my object is to show what I have found and not what I am looking for.”
–Pablo Picasso
Many times when I start on a picture, I start by throwing patterns up on the screen, either royalty-fractals or mixtures of gradients or just splashes of colour. I play around putting various filter and light effects on the pieces and just play, rather like a child finger-painting. Occasionally something will happen in this random picture and an image will turn up. I don’t look for it tho am open to whatever develops. When the image comes along, (this happened in the Wrath picture earlier this week) I start enhancing it, either combining it with a reference or enlarging that part while shrinking other parts, muting out the background and bringing the found image to the foreground. I then continue on, certain that the picture has revealed to me what it wishes to be. It feels totally natural rather like how I have heard sculptures talk about the block of marble containing a particular statue inside and they just bring it out. I love creating this ‘found’ art fully as much if not more than the pictures I set out intentionally to create.
Blessings, G
“What should I possibly have to tell you, oh venerable one? Perhaps that you’re searching far too much? That in all that searching, you don’t find the time for finding?”
― Hermann Hesse
In searching for the true essence of something, do we deconstruct it, reduce it to its component elements? In all the parts that make up our physical form, where do we find our essence… a doctor (or butcher) could dissect us in every way possible and still never see it… Perhaps to understand the essence of something, the trick is not to open it but to open ourselves…and find that in ourselves that relates…
True Mirrors, whether they be people or objects can either cause us unbelievable bliss or painful aversion..all depending on how well we can handle what is reflected back to us..
It’s not meaning that we search for as much as that something in ourselves that will help us know and understand.
Last Remnant of a Dying Order by G A Rosenberg 
Butterfly Seeking a Way Out by G A Rosenberg 
