At the center of meditation in the Direct Realization practice there may be another aspect to consider. When pared with an arts process we may open the way for new kinds of creativity. There is a dimension of practice, well known in the cultural arts of Japan, that has been an enigma for me since I first experienced tea ceremony, calligraphy and archery at Zen Temples while living in Kyoto. It is the practice of non-doing. As I understand non-doing, I am cultivating a willingness to release the power of my influence, habitual behavior that I have cultivated all my life, in order to explore it. Or I might even attempt to engage with art materials at the interface of my release of control.

Working with Jeff Carreira has encouraged me to not only experiment with my own process but with the process of the painters who come to paint in my studio. Almost two years ago I offered exercises and meditations from Direct Realization and the Opening to the Infinite Program to introduced a different access to the creative process. One of the results everyone agreed upon was they felt more available to resources beyond their usual arena. This year with Mark-making we are continuing to explore an engagement with materials and methods beyond the creative process dominated by the customary training in the visual arts. In this program we surrendered to what we are calling the field, that consciousness which we are all a part. Along with a strong component of mutual learning, we are finding something fresh and authentic showing up in our work.

An example of the experimental reframing is the work we do with Notan-a Japanese word that means holding as a whole the extreme dark and light in a visual image. There is a subtlety here that is not simply a concept of design or composition. It is about learning to see past the negative space of background, which brings us into the territory of learned separation establishing unconscious polarity. When we view our color images in black and white we can see the notan discernibly, which more clearly exposes degrees of balance/imbalance, stasis/movement and content that could be missed in the isolated object. The notan is also a metaphor for seeing not objects or oppositions but a larger context. This work with my painters has intensified my own pursuits in this area.

The meditation I used with my five paintings adventure of suspended-doing was a concept I learned in aikido, which combines keen alertness with a relaxed flow. Jeff Carreira named it for me as effortful-effortlessness. This kind of audacious proposition needs to be cultivated and it takes an ardent discipline to stay in a meditation of allowing-the-field and at the same time an easeful responsive flow.

When painting, knowing when to stop is one of the biggest challenges. It is a given that one wants a piece that works; a piece that has a certain resolution when finished. In the mark-making endeavor the end seems to come arbitrarily and the challenge is to suspend our usual desire and expectation. That means painting without preference, letting the decision points determine themselves. This feels counter to all previous navigation devices in painting, and at the same time it is possible to achieve. It brings out very different insights and results.

Because I was more concerned with being available or allowing the field to work me than to engage line, color or form for a purpose, the resultant paintings were done in a tenth the time. They were large paintings, all different from each other. What interests me was my reaction to the finished work. I did not identify with them as being a part of me, as often is so with a finished piece. I simply had little or no attachment. In fact they continue to startle me as I see them sitting around the studio, often for a nano-second I wonder where they came from.

I do not know if these pieces reflect the field or non-doing, but in the last few months when my painters did the effortful-effortless meditation and played with these concepts in terms of mark-making there was a stark recognition of honesty and immediacy in their work. I noticed for myself an expanded creativity. It has been an interesting endeavor with no definitive conclusion but this process is well worth refining and pursuing.