Author: Jack Barratt
I am restless, motionless, wildness, madness
I am of many moods, dispositions, tendencies, traits
I love everything, nothing and all in between
I desire to be, to sing, to fall, to falter, to whisper
Are we not universes, my dear?
I share, care, leave and arrive before I’m called
I am shunned, worshipped, clothed
And hammered into submission
I have become even my opposites and through negation
Have arrived at perfection
What is left when the glass is full?
What is left when the balloon is full of air already?
Bursting, overflowing, crashing, smiling
I am incompetent and forlorn, but I practise happiness
And I am obedient to life’s weather
Instead of acceptance, I practised contradiction
I forced myself off the page of existence
And what remains now is the moon of laughter
The Contradiction – taken from Jack’s first poetry collection: For Things That Pass
All real artists have a voice, a vision and a unique perspective that they express in sound, image, word or movement. But is the right to free, creative expression reserved only for those who operate within traditionally artistic disciplines like music, painting or poetry?
If we look at the natural world around us, at the flora, fauna and habitats that house them in a state of perpetual, harmonious symbiosis, then we can perceive the hand of a supreme artist at work. Interestingly, this artist is not separate from his creation. The artist who has fashioned the entirety of this manifest existence lives within and lives as his creation. That artist is within us. That artist is within everyone. That artist is life itself.
The supreme artist has created all of us as unique, original beings. There is no one exactly like us in the whole world. Yet, do we all feel this uniqueness, do we embrace this uniqueness, and are we fearless about expressing this uniqueness? Many of us have not even ventured inside ourselves to discover and explore this uniqueness, let alone express it in the outside world. One reason for this is that uniqueness is not encouraged in this society. Uniqueness and originality are expressions of wisdom, and this society is not wise at all—it is ignorant, cruel and led by cowards, hypocrites and criminals.
Life becomes art when we live from the heart. This means that all of our actions and choices arise from the deepest possible place within us. This ‘deep place’ within us is often where our inexplicable attraction to certain objects and experiences comes from. We may like a certain type of music, a certain type of food, and we may even feel attracted to a certain kind of spiritual path or tradition. However, there are often no specific, tangible or utilitarian reasons behind these attractions. They just exist innately within us like our eye or hair colour. Growing up, these natural attractions and inclinations can be side-tracked by the influence of people who believe that everything must have a practical, and often economic, reason and result. The moment that our inexplicable attractions and interests are suppressed, the sense of playfulness is lost from life. From having the potential to be a beautiful, unique flower, we become another lifeless brick in the wall.
When an artist is creating a piece of music or a painting, he is feeling which note, which harmonic choice, or which colour combination is the most pleasing for his own sensibility. He is not thinking about what will be the most pleasing for his audience. When the artist starts catering to his audience, he becomes an entertainer and not an artist. It is also like this in life. When we live, when we make decisions, are we doing exactly what we feel like doing, or are we catering to the audience of our family, friends, culture and society? When we start living the way others think we should, we stop living—we begin to lose our connection with the creative life principle inside of us.
To become an artist in life, we must live fearlessly and creatively. We must catch hold of the unique flow of our own being with all of its genuine passions and interests. We must learn to tune out the noises of people who wish to fill us with fear, doubt and inane, second-hand ideas on how and how not to live.
Life is something that we must discover for ourselves. We must find it from within ourselves. The originality within us is always trying to speak to and express itself through us. We must learn to listen to that voice. We must then become that voice. We must become the song of life as it wishes to be sung through us. There is tremendous joy and freedom in living this way. The feelings of joy, openness, freedom and lightness are there when life is allowed to flow, to express, to create. We must become that flow. We, as individuals, are a one-time occurrence in this world. Let us live life as a singular, fantastic, flowing event. Let us not lose our lives in fear and an imitative attitude that arises as a result of that fear. Let us live life as art. Let us partake in the ongoing, eternal masterpiece of the supreme artist—life itself.
