Carl Jung, the famous psychotherapist, used them personally and professionally as an aid in accessing the psyche for growth. Mandalas are composed of geometric designs generally repeated in a circular pattern and are designed to be colored and depending on why the mandala is used, a variety of materials are used to give color: dyed sand and corn pollen are two possibilities.
Personal coloring of mandalas is useful as a means to relaxation and as an aid in meditation. For people like me who have a difficult time sitting still, coloring a mandala is helpful for remaining in a meditative state. I've discovered that keeping my hands and eyes engaged as I fill in the design quiets both the chatter in my mind as well as the restlessness in my body.
All this is background to saying that about a year ago when I received the packet I decided to incorporate coloring into my meditation time. I loved coloring mandalas! I loved seeing the black and white background bloom into color, I loved the gentle sensation of falling into a more deeply relaxed state fairly quickly and easily and I really began to appreciate the activity when I discovered that when I simply thought of how a color represented the beauty of creation or when I chose a simple thought as uppermost in my mind, the coloring in a circular manner seemed to expand my understanding and appreciation of whatever was happening within myself. Needless to say, I was hooked and when I get hooked on something - especially if it is pleasurable - I tend to jump in feet-first.
Jumping into this newly discovered activity I began to play with various materials for coloring: markers, crayons, a brief fling with watercolors and pastels, and finally, colored pencils. When I found colored pencils I discovered that not only were there lots and lots of different kinds of pencils - each brand laying down slightly different shades of color and the hardness or softness of what the color part of the pencil was also altered the tone of color. Oh my! so many options were suddenly available! I do not even want to tell myself how much I have spent on colored pencils - suffice to say that I have at this time six different brands of pencil - all of which I use - as well as an old set from my mom that I took from the house after they died. She also loved to draw and when I create with my pencils I feel her smiling - which of course, just adds to the enjoyment.
As I spent time creating with my pencils I made some wonderful discoveries about both art and the art of living. I was thinking about all of this as I sat on the patio this morning working on a new creation. I have gotten to a point where I am able to create my own mandalas, although I also color printed designs, and learning that I am capable of creating my own design that is actually good has been a completely unexpected discovery.
An unexpected discovery because my perception of myself is that I cannot draw. This perception is both accurate and inaccurate. {Have you ever noticed that the older one gets, the more paradoxical an awfully lot of life is?} The perception is accurate in that at least to this point when I attempt to reproduce an object or scene using lines for definition the result often appears to have been executed by an eight year-old child. However when I reproduce an image laying down thin layers of color, using color to create the form, a quite pleasing image often emerges.
Emerge: to come out into view; to come to light. Syn: appear, surface, be revealed. My discovery in laying down thin layers of color of various tones upon tones, was that slowly an image would begin to reveal: disclose itself. I will confess that this process of learning to lay down these thin layers has taken me months of learning a kind of patience that is not particularly natural. The part of this process of layering that is natural to me is that I am easily enchanted and that encouraged me enough to stick with learning to be patient. Watching color take on form and depth as shades and tones are layered atop one another is really enchanting.
What I also found enchanting, in fact, downright magical, was that color attracts color - quite literally one color will 'grab' onto another color that somehow {I'm sure a color wheel would explain this} is similar enough, or has the right components of light and so that a particular area already holding colors, becomes enhanced, enabling depth and form to surface: an image emerges. Voila!! Magic happens.
Another discovery I made while learning to lay down thin layers of color was that it is much easier to correct mistakes when the color has not been put down heavily. I have two very lovely erasers, one is polymer and one is gum and both are designed to 'pick up' graphite and color flakes. I call them my 'sin eaters.' This is their reason for existence: to carefully remove my mistakes so I am able to continue learning, experimenting and creating. The only time I panic about trying something new anymore with my coloring is when I have somehow misplaced my 'sin eaters' - which happens rather regularly, and then I have to stop and go searching as I've learned that without my 'sin eaters' I become timid and my creativity is stifled.
So, as I was enjoying laying down layer after layer of color this morning and watching a calla lilly emerge - and only a short time ago if you had told me I would be able to make a calla lilly appear from my hand onto a piece of white paper, I would have told you you were nuts, it hit me that my morning quiet time works exactly in this manner in terms of allowing the goodness of life to emerge. When I take my quiet time - even as little as 15 minutes - and begin my day by just sitting and breathing in the Goodness of life: gratitude, love and beauty are primary for me, it is as though I am laying down thin layers of goodness upon my psyche. Those thin layers on my psyche create a kind of canvas of intention. I believe those layers of Goodness will 'catch' other experiences of Goodness as I go out into my day.
If I begin my day with a bit of time dedicated for only experiencing and acknowledging Goodness, I am creating the 'colors' of attitude for my day. It works pretty much exactly as the color from the pencils does: the bottom layers 'grab' color that matches it in tone or light content and a deeper, richer tone of color appears. If I start the day laying down tones of goodness, love, gratitude, appreciation of beauty and faith in the abundance of life, then there is a very good chance that no matter what occurs, those attitudes are going to attract similar perceptions. Even when experiences I call 'yucky' happen, I have learned that the more frequently I have practiced laying down the tones of positive intention, the less likely it is that the unpleasant or yucky will stay around for long. For one thing I have learned that I not only have erasers for art that are 'sin eaters' I have erasers for living that are 'sin eaters.'
Before I go much further I need to tell you that I'm not much into the concept of sin, primarily because I consider dwelling on it useless and because I think it is a redundant concept. The concept of sin is redundant because it indicates 'missing the mark' or making an error and if you are human and especially a human who is growing, developing and and creating anew, you are going to make mistakes: it's the nature of being human. Dwelling on the problem inherent in the natural design is an exercise in futility. Best to dwell on the best applications of human: you want pretty flowers? Use pretty colors.
I use the tern 'sin eater' for my erasers because it amuses me to watch those gummy things remove my errors like those fish that eat dead skin. Just amazing. Continuing to grow and develop in life means making errors. If I do not have a means of accurately noticing and then removing the error then, as a human being, the tendency is to become very timid about living or in extreme cases, not give a damn. Neither attitude is useful for creating.
Given that I'm human, I need a means to 'removing' my errors so I can be creative and offer my day to the service of life. I've discovered that my morning time is not only my time of laying down the layers of perception and attitude I want for the 'canvas' of my day it also works as a great 'sin eater.' How? Because this time of 'drinking' goodness and active appreciation, resets
my intention for living this day.
When I begin my day with a minimum of 15 minutes of quiet time I get to start my life over once again. I do not carry yesterday with me. If I find I am worried or anxious or disquieted about something, then I mention the issue to my HP {Higher Power} but I do not beat it to death by going over and over and over the who, what, where, when and why of the feelings' origin. Using that behavior for dealing with something unpleasant is like wanting to bring out deep tones of sunset or the sea by rubbing a black crayon over and over the space: you're not going to get what you desire. You are using the wrong tool. Telling the same story of 'being done wrong to' or beating your breast again and again with, 'oh, I can never be forgiven for this' is exactly opposite to how to improve life.
Here's the trick for lightening a color or mood: add some version of light. Pretty nifty trick. Actually a fairly obvious trick that I'd forget rather quickly if I didn't take my early morning time to do exactly that with my day. Actually I learned this trick about adding light to what feels dark or heavy by watching the sunrise: add just the barest layer of the sun's light to the darkness of night and a glorious new day will emerge. Add thoughts and images of beauty to melancholy and the feeling will lighten; add the fire of what you are passionate about to confusion and the light will produce some clarity. Add readings on love, generosity and kindness to feelings loneliness and fear and the tightness of those bonds will loosen and allow you to breathe.
Colors with similar amounts and tones of light 'grab' similar colors so that depth and tone emerge. Lay down enough layers of these tones and a form with depth and richness of tone will take shape. Intentional breathing in of goodness, beauty, passion, love, generosity soon after awakening will create a canvas of perception for your day that allows similar attitudes and experiences to be 'grabbed' onto the canvas. Your life and being will begin to shimmer with added depth and richness of tone.
Just like my drawings, this is process of creating a canvas of perception requires patience. While coloring, it took me a while to learn how to lay down thin layers of pencil so the enchantment of shaded tones of color emerged as an image. It has taken a disciplined commitment to my early morning time in order to have enough thin layers of intention for the 'form' of attitude in living to emerge: come out into view. But oh my, each time I get to experience even a slight adjustment in my attitude for experiencing life, when even the slightest shift from old attitude to desired attitude occurrs such as an encounter that once would have made me aggravated and sharp-tongued and this time I barely noticed annoyance, oh dear heavens I get thrilled. Thrilled because I no longer try so darn hard; the only hard part, difficult part was the committment to the fifiteen minutes of regular morning time for drinking the beauty of life.
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