One hundred years ago the painter and poet William Blake lamented the ever-increasing violence of industrial society with these words: "Art degraded, Imagination Denied, War Govern'd the Nations." The dominance of war and war mentalities... all this is the price we have paid in the West for denying imagination, repressing or forgetting it, and thereby degrading art… To create is always to learn, to begin over, to begin at zero... With art as meditation we truly listen to the cosmos within us and around us and give birth to the ongoing cosmogenesis of our world...
How can I stay completely present to this world—the light and the dark—while still keeping an open loving heart: Who ever promised me the world would be perfect...I need to set a different course by reminding myself that humankind has always been flawed...and Love and light continue to exist anyway. The news should simply inspire me to be extra loving and tender...Today I resolve to balance every dose of darkness I receive with an equal, if not greater, dose of light...I resolve to check the balance daily and provide myself with the silence and solitude I need to maintain it. I truly believe it does matter what energy we put out into the world.
~ Ann O’Shaughnessy, former co-editor of “Heron Dance,” founder of soulflares.org
