The Notebook 10: Mandalas of the Path

 Welcome to the Notebook series.  These are stories from my time abroad, each connected to one main take-away that I learned during those years.

Read the preceding Notebook posts here: INTRO // 1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 // 7 // 8 // 9

This post contains the story for the insight: "True joy comes from inner wisdom, not from following what you think others want you to do," titled, "Mandalas of the Path."

Reading time: 4 minutes

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MANDALAS OF THE PATH

"True joy comes from inner wisdom, not from following what you think others want you to do"

Becoming an artist during my time abroad was certainly never a part of my plan.  It happened so organically, which I think makes it all the better.  At my 10 day Vipassana silent retreat in early 2020, something deep in my gut told me my best next step would be to move to Pokhara, a place I had already spent some time and knew I loved, and set up/launch a website for my art.

The seed for my art website had been planted a couple months earlier, at Kopan.  Fellow students had seen me making mandalas and wanted to know the name of my website, which I did not yet have.  I created the name and registered it just before leaving the monastery for good on New Year's Eve, 2019.  The website was mostly blank until after my Vipassana retreat, when I happily followed my inner wisdom to Pokhara to make my site the mandala art island I wanted it to be.  I absolutely was just doing this for fun, then.  I didn't expect to make any real money from it, or even to do it for longer than a couple of months.

Why?

I never considered being an artist as a job.  No one ever told me it could be one.  I had a stack of limiting beliefs in my head: "Artists are starving," "I could never be successful as an artist," "I would be disappointing people who had expected a more traditional career from me."  I have still this idea that people won't take this path of mine seriously once I'm back in the US, a still very salient fear of mine.  But you know what?

Other people are not my inner wisdom.

Other people often give self-serving advice, or advice based on fear/lack of knowledge.

Other people's opinions of me don't matter nearly as much as my opinions of me.

If my inner wisdom is telling me something, I am going to do my dang best to listen to it.  Because it has led me to the best things in my life: my partner, my beliefs, my art business, my travel, and even to going home now when it feels right to me, not just because someone else told me to.

I resolve to listen to and honor my inner wisdom.  Because I know now from experience that this is the way to true joy.

The way to suffering?  Blindly obeying others - or, worse, what you think others want you to do.

The way to freedom and joy?  Inner wisdom, all the way.

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My first exhibit, in Pokhara, Nepal.  See my art website here.

***PSST: I'm launching my first collection of original artworks on Thursday 6/17!  See you HERE at 8am...***

WHAT I HAVE LEARNED

✅ 1. J hunchha ramro ko lagi hunchha (All that will be, will be for good)

✅ 2. Nothing is in our control except for how we respond

✅ 3. Plans are illusory - and can cloud your vision

✅ 4. The present moment is the only reality

✅ 5. Our minds create our lives

✅ 6. Everything and everyone are connected in more ways than we can ever understand

✅ 7. Compassion is the key to happiness

✅ 8. If we were in other people's shoes, we would be doing exactly what they are, because then we would be them

✅ 9. Everyone and everything are impermanent

✅ 10. True joy comes from inner wisdom, not from following what you think others want you to do

11. Whatever we go through is not personal, not permanent, and has good in it

12. Enjoy the present.  It is all that we have.

Read all published posts from the Notebook Series here.

Stay tuned for the stories that accompany each of these in the coming weeks.

So much love, from home.

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