What if you could learn to see in a different way?
The E-Cafe is about exploring AHA moments, the art of observation, learning from one another and attempting to snag a piece of the illusive ‘it’ and “what if” factors…a life-long process.
Why do we see the way we do and how can we enhance our abilities to embrace or conjure new points of view if we choose…and what gets in our way of doing that?
As an artist I have some thoughts as to how we can ‘gather’ more ways of seeing and why that is so important in today’s world.
The original 18 posts were written in sequence. They can stand alone but reading them in order unfolds my thoughts more elegantly. They are listed under “Seeing in New Ways.”
The art inserted throughout is the result of a process I created to demonstrate ‘learning to see the world in other ways.’ There are 25 of them accessible by clicking above on Alex Art Studio 145 and selecting mixed media.
The next group of posts will be more random in subject matter and posted under ‘The Conversation’…maybe things like ‘Find the passion or die’ or Do we have to find our passion?, The diversity factor, Teaching moments… and so on. We’ll see.
Seeing in New Ways
This I know. I’d like to get to the end of my life having actually seen it. As an artist, I naturally see the power in conscious observation and I get clearly that What I see matters less than How I see it…in life as well as in art. The first eighteen or so posts will explore the process of learning to see through new and diverse lenses and the imperative to do that. From there [...]
1. The What if Factor
What if you could learn to see the world in a different way; to see the ordinary in extra-ordinary ways? And what if you could free your mind in a way that allowed for more and new perspectives to show up? What if a new way of seeing made room for the usual to show itself in different and surprising ways? This is about that process. It’s about the What If Factor...What if you could see [...]
2. Seeing the ordinary in extraordinary ways
How I arrived at these images and the exercise of What if? Awhile back I was creating a process for a group of corporate executives attending an 'innovation’ retreat. The goal was that by the end of the day, they would have learned to see the world in new ways...with new eyes or beginners eyes. The seminar I was designing spoke to curiosity, noticing, perception, intuitive intelligence and 'syntropic' influences in manifesting something from nothing. [...]
3. Why we should care about how we see our world.
In my first post, I discussed the What if Factor and how I came to create an exercise that explored seeing the world in extra-ordinary ways. The images you see here are the result of that process. You can see in these collages that there are very few actual human parts but our minds easily translate an egg for a head, spinach for hair and seaweed for fingers as perfectly comprehensible. What we see is [...]
4. The domain of rigid relics
One of the gifts we have as human becomings is that of a creative spirit, whether we recognize it or not, whether we use it or not. Like a pilot light, the flame holds constant in a quiet place until sparked by desire, need or magic to shine a light on a new thought or a new idea. We also have a kind of invisible bubble around us that can either limit our ability to [...]
5. We are very good at not noticing that we are not noticing.
We’ve all experienced something like driving from point A to point B and having arrived at B remembering little or nothing of the trip. I decided years ago that I didn’t want to do this life-trip and have a white-out about the details of it when I got to the other end. Choosing to notice our lives is a gift that has tremendous value in the moment as well as over time. We can become [...]
6. Noticing life between the lines…
We are, most of us, trapped in an ‘if this, then that’ kind of seeing modality...a what you see is what you get way of observing the world. But, we know that 'this' is not always followed by a clearly defined 'that'. We know things aren’t always what they seem. So why do some of us tend to take things at surface value and never get to a place of asking...wait a minute...how else can [...]
7. The Power of a Question
A compelling question creates movement in this universe of ours. That...I know for sure. From the many notes and journals I’ve kept over the years something of a gift emerged. Writing was a way of reconciling some of my own questions, and, as always, creating many new ones which, naturally, became the catalyst for new thoughts and again, more questions. It’s a crazy, cool loop to be caught up in...the whole curiosity thing. The aha was [...]