Seeing is Knowing

Finding a place I can see with new eyes.

“The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in the way,” William Blake wrote “As a man is, so he sees.”

Expectations and Seeing
How we see our world shapes what we know according to Andy Clark, cognitive psychologist. Our brains make predictions of what it expects to see and limits our reality to that. “Those predictions then structure and shape the whole of human experience,” Clark continues, “from the way we interpret a person’s facial expression, to our feelings of pain, to our plans for an outing to the cinema.” It’s true, what we perceive today is embodied in what we experienced yesterday, and all the days before. Past histories are important. Seeing is knowing.

Discovering Yourself
All my life I’ve loved water and trees. It can be a mountain stream, farm pond, and, visited last month, Hanging Horn, a large Minnesota lake rippling with a strong north wind and rimmed with dancing ladies wearing tutus of orange and yellow leaves. Those flirty cottonwoods curtsying and prancing fill me with nostalgia for my Mother, an observer, a seer who had the wise eyes of an artist. Mother was touched by nature and all that it contained. Through painting she was guided inwardly to a larger and more bountiful life. Maxime Lagace said, “By discovering nature you discover yourself.”

As she grew older, Mother gained new perspectives and a deeper appreciation for all that was. Her canvases in later years shine depth and authenticity, a kind of awareness that can only be created by living in tandem with green things, in the open, nature. In one painting an old knotted apple tree sways at its knees and another, a copse of aspens with branches playing with each other like school age friends. Mother’s depiction of a ramshackle grey barn with a young boy chasing a mutt is my favorite. On the canvas, too, a towering oak tree, the father of all trees, is a carved heart with initials. Mother’s D.K. alongside initials of someone else. It took me a while before I recognized the letters were not father’s. Seeing is knowing. Even at age seventy Mother was a romantic.

Sending Invocations
The last night at Hanging Horn we sit close to the water’s edge gathered shoulder to shoulder around a campfire. The lake a black mirror reflecting pinpoints of light. Marshmallows burnt hang from pointed sticks. Symphonic layers of sudden laughter rise as some fall unbidden into the flames. “Oh, no, another one, Gram!” A chilly wind kicks up the fire’s embers that float like tiny Chinese good luck lanterns into the dark sky. I close my eyes and send silent invocations summoning the spirit of Pegasus, the constellation of creativity, inspiration and freedom. Watching my granddaughters’ turned faces look up I see Pegasus transformed in them. All light and love, emancipated. — “alive” in the world.  And, as Joanna Macy beautifully described, “…with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it—is a wonder beyond words.”— Becky Breed

Writing/Creativity exercise:

1. Choose a memory from a time you were in nature. Who were you with? What did you do? Describe the colors and season. Why is it important to you? Suggested activities: Artists, create a canvas reflecting this memory. For writers, create a prose piece or poem about your favorite nature memory.
2. Select a type of tree you are most like or would like to be. For example, a fruit bearing fruit, a giant redwood, a Christmas fir, one splintered by lightning but still alive, the tree you grew up with or your choice. What characteristics will you relate? Passions? If the tree could talk (maybe it has), what would she say? Now write.
3. Invocations are deeply held convictions asking for guidance or assistance. Today, what words would you use? To whom? Write your own invocation.
4. What does being “alive” in the world mean? Tell a trusted friend what this means to you.