Letter to S.D.

2011_11_04 Letter to S.D.

Yes by all means send me digital pictures of “The Rock Climber” and “Magic Garden.” Having them would give some option for BRIDGE IN THE FOG. They are two of my best drawings from the late seventies. “The Rock Climber” embodies my spiritual ambitions and projects them upward.
Rather then climbing the Tree of Life I ascent up a mountain and shoot for the moon, my cosmic habitat. Vertical ascent dominates my imagination, as does the moon when it comes to soul making. I have never gotten over the spell it weaved in my inner life during the INFERNO.

Steve Jobs talked about how the prospect of death helped him define himself and honed his vision of things. Being in ill health and being on oxygen has made me acutely aware of my age and the road ahead is very short compared to the road in the opposite direction. These threats to my existence have honed my ambition to get my book project done before it’s too late. I am greatly motivated to accomplish that, as it will constitute my main legacy. What got seeded in me during the INFERNO has come to fruition. As see it, since that turn-around experience, which included a rebirth scenario, I have been engaged in, to quote William Blake and James Hillman, “soul making.” Even Gurdjieff’ had a notion about being seeded, saying we were all born with a “certain inner property” that we were charged with transforming into a living self. I have tried my best to do that and I can die knowing I gave it my best shot. And I recorded the process in three books, thousand of pages in my journal, and in numerous drawings. While others have created “necktie art” I worked on myself. As Heraclitus told his students the essence of philosophy was, “I searched myself.”

JP