Abyss

August 13, 2015

The mind creates the abyss, the heart crosses it. –Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

At every moment of our lives, we all have one foot in a fairy tale and the
other in the abyss. Paulo Coelho

Emerging and Abyss were painted in tandem. I often paint two canvases simultaneously as they have a dialogue between them. It was an odd evening at the studio. It wasn’t the studio or anyone else present who was odd. It
was me.

I was in between worlds, feeling emotionally fatigued. The journey through decades of abuse and darkness becomes a sleep walk through thickets of disbelief and confusion. How did I get here? Is there a way out? The answer to the way out might mean that the framework of your belief system of yourself and your place in it must be rebuilt after such
destruction. And the rebuilding is disorienting.

Even if you’re fortunate enough, brave enough, strong enough to destroy the previous nightmare you found yourself living, the aftermath finds you mentally confused. It¹s akin to another sort of dream. The sort of dream
where you wake up from a deep sleep and wonder if what you dreamed was real or imaginary. The ‘Wait. What just happened?’ sort of dream. It’s the point at which you realize that you sit precisely in between worlds. Leaving behind one, and not yet realizing the one you are soon to enter. A purgatory before the prize. No more to say. It was simply odd. And the painting’s message was clear.