Divine Appreciation

There's a moment in any day where they clubs clear, the sun sets and beams light fall from the sky, tumbling to the ground with heavenly grace. A divine moment of natural beauty, perfectly capturing the power of the universe and the cosmic flukes that happen within it but this can happen any day, you merely have to look for them. That ideal window of time where nature boasts it's tremendous humble being. Similarly, a storm that rages maintains a similar sense of outstanding elegance, littering the sky with brilliant bolts of lightning and roars of thunder. Rage incarnate on display for the world to behold. It provokes a sense of mortality, a modest understanding of our role in the world, with each other. Art, at least for me, has always had a similar quality.

As with these snapshots of natural phenomena, we each have moments of serendipitous idealism, profound inspiration where we simply cannot help but find a creative outlet through which to display this emotion, any emotion, for at this particular moment and this moment only you are truly capable. Your heart is in your hands and you are able to put it to paper in the form of art or writing, or music or craft or any other form of passionate display.

Much like a storm, I have moments of overwhelming fury and the only way I have ever been able to release it is through art. Displaying that same suffering through markings on a surface, a tangible example of raw emotion for others to observe and perhaps misunderstand, undervalue or even disregard entirely. But that's okay because it was never for them. Many people don't experience that same fury so have no point of reference from which to comprehend it.

Similarly though on the other end of the spectrum, I have moments of bliss akin to evening sunbeams. On the rare occasion that it lines up with a moment of pure inspiration I am capable of creating something beautiful. Of course beauty is objective as with all art, though I often find that the work I produce in this perfect moments is what I strive to recreate in my general practice. It is proof that I am capable and with time, I can competently replicate and refine these moments. To consistently display passion on a page.

After all, that's what this is, unadulterated passion of no particular kind. It may stem from resentment and anger, love and betrayal or existential discomfort. It could even be described as mundane in concept, though in practice, much like humanity itself, the experience is infinitely complex and layered, unrelenting and harsh and frustrating but resulting in something unique and beautiful, worth every suffering moment. You are rewarded with a legacy for your work stands independent of you in service of humanity as a display of our capabilities, our individualism and our passions.

It can be shared with others, these beast of a feeling can at a certain point be tamed, it can be nurtured and eventually even taught. We can motivate ourselves into states of elevated compassion in order to better reflect the human condition whether that be peoples needs, wants and desires or their own compassion and individuality. Art is, at its heart, the culmination of human experience in its most raw form. To be a spokesperson on behalf of our species is a massive responsibility that shouldn't be taken lightly.

Every line I draw, every sketch I scrap and ever dab of paint I apply is both in service and disservice to society without the appropriate experience. I don't know the horrors of war but I know more fundamental horrors, that of the dark, the unknown, existential dread and honestly fearing for your life in a given moment. Specificity is not necessary but experience is. Understanding who we are and what makes us tick is vital to conveying honest work, accurate representations of ourselves and the pain we may have gone through, our optimism despite that pain and the joy we get from the cosmic rewards of positivity.

We are such turbulent, often unstable creatures filled to the brim with memories both good and bad, each of us contributing to who we become in later life. We are all children scared of the dark, all lashing out in our own way in seek of peace though we are cursed with the knowledge that one day we will have it. We do not last forever, though many things persist beyond us. We leave an impact on the world whether we like it or not, we will be remembered perhaps not as a person but as an attitude, passed down through our children and their children, or simply through those around us. Perhaps by the environment we live in, whether we choose to nurture our surroundings or remain self involved enough to consider only our physical time on this planet. What we leave behind is how we truly live, our lifespan is merely our time to refine that legacy so that when we're gone, we're represented further as people we wanted to be seen as.

Whether you are careless, frightened, joyful, mournful, sociable or anything else, we are remembered as such for our actions truly do have consequence far beyond our immediate perception. Does it not provide inner peace to know these moments of inspiration exist to maintain and refine our legacy? To know that what we leave behind is of a quality that we are most capable of producing. It may take a lifetime to get to a point where you truly understand your outlet in a way that lets your produce said works, though the knowledge that we are each capable in our own way of leaving behind knowledge and skill as proof of our existence for generations to come surely stirs a contentment, be it humbling or well deserved, we each have an opportunity to produce something wonderful to contribute to the development of mankind in our own name.

Though I may suffer at length, though I may spend time ecstatic and full of love, it is wasted if not shared. We owe it to each other to help develop perspective, to show that there is hope with images of love, and show that there is company in suffering. No one is alone and we all have something to aspire towards. Feel inspired, maintain and appreciate that feeling and let it not go to waste through selfish means as it is our duty as a person to help others in any way we know how, let alone how perfect moments like this will help yourself. Allow yourself to feel, use your gifts to imitate real experience and from there nurture inner peace having realised that you've done more than was ever demanded of you. A life well spent, a life well remembered.