“Art enables us to find ourselves and loose ourselves at the same time.” Thomas Merton.
For sometime now, I have used my painting as a form of mediation . In my corporate life I have always recognised how important it is to make time to stop thinking about work and find balance. Stimulating my creative thinking and finding new things that interest me. When I paint I do just that. I find that I experience what is referred to as ‘a flow state‘, where I become completely absorbed, focused and relaxed, happily creating something new in the world.
According to my research and reading about this important, ‘flow state’, on the site I found called Zen Habits, there are a number of steps you can take to move into this state.
First be doing what you enjoy or love, then choose an important task that is both challenging and achievable, followed by making the time, free of distractions and in the right location so that you are enabled to get absorbed in that task for as long as possible. From my experience, you also find yourself unaware of how much time is passing. This can or cannot be a good thing, depending on what you need and or if this enables you ‘to find and loose yourself at the same time.” according to Thomas Merton .
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