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YOUNGBEAR ROTH
Tao, Zen, and Writer's-MInd
In the beginning, our expression of the individual creative process grows out of an a priori belief. The statement that we hold an a priori belief is ironic. It must be, because humanity is only capable of a relative experience through which we view our universe. When I say relative, I mean, something, a quality must always already exist or we have nothing to build upon. We simply are not available to absolutes. During the day, first we are hot and then believe in a world of open doors and windows. At night, first we are cold, and then shutting our doors we burn wooden Buddhas for warmth. Yet, as far as it goes, we claim certain a priori beliefs, and that after the fact, as we learn to perceive the universe through these beliefs, we find the experience of living our days and nights strengthens this a priori knowledge. It is upon this knowledge that our individual reflection of the creative process grows, and eventually transcends itself.
This transcendence theory is critical and so I hope you all grasped it. Because books and screenplays don't appear. They are end products - at the moment - of a structure the writer put into practice to transcend itself and become the sum of its parts and more!
Now, I have to get back to Zen and Taoism because it's through those practices that I learned to express my artistic nature, and they are the structure through which I teach. They are my home ground, and I feel most comfortable through them, and I hope you will too. Often, when I'm teaching a class, I won't use those terms - Zen and Tao - because I don't wish to alienate people with strange sounding words, but the words I use are usually representative of those concepts.
***
As a philosophical Taoist, what is my a priori belief? As an artist, what is my individual springboard, the firm foundation from which, and through which, my artistic quest shapes itself? Today's Buddhism is widely believed to be a godless religion or philosophical practice. However, neither Buddha or Lao Tzu discussed God's existence one way or the other, though Buddha was schooled in a polytheistic culture, and Lao Tzu came close to admitting a monotheistic perception of the universe driven by an all-pervasive, political intelligence. My a priori statement; our universe is born, and burns, and blossoms using an all-pervasive intelligence with which the creative process develops. An inherent, intelligent, cosmological light is the first and continuing artist. I do not believe the statement can be made for a creative intelligence separate from the universe - creative intelligence and the universe is a single torch.
What qualities of the creative process support the existence of, and define intelligence?
Observe a quality of permission in the universe - the permission in space and time to become, to create. Some of us may view this creation process as willy-nilly, devoid of order and form. Although, science, while it cannot prove the existence of intelligence, can certainly measure the creative process's order and form. Science is in the business of taking what is visible and scientifically known, and utilizing it to measure that which is invisible, thereby decreeing it as known. So, old-field science uses classical physics to measure and predict, with some variables, a result called quantum physics. Science informs the west of what the east has known for centuries, that the creative process does indeed operate out of form, an intelligent order. The universe is born of creative process. The creative process is born of intelligence. If the universal creative process has intelligence working within to establish order and form, must it have a direction?
From note to measure to the bar, to the musical composition; from the letter to the word, to the sentence, the paragraph and finally the book; from seed to root, to the tree, to the forest - creativity develops along a virtual path from simple to complex. To creatively meet life is to harmonize with The Path. As artists, we use our chosen medium of expression to guide us along this path, to enable our realization of The Path. Living as a philosophical Taoist and daily sitting in zazen is part of my practice. Just as important, my art, the art of writing, plays a large role in my life practice.
For myself, art is much like science - that is, I use what is known to ask questions about those things in life I'm not so sure I've got a handle on, and I continue the writing, the intelligent process of creative discovery, until the unknown becomes known to me. Scientism within the creative process is another facet holding and spreading light throughout the gem. Science, art, and a spiritual belief in universal intelligence are all a part of the creative process. Sacrificing one to the other means losing touch with our path, it means living out of harmony with the universe. Humankind's true face is a naturally unified cosmos, our work is the practice of realizing our path, and our worth is the value of the writing process, the creative process - for the process is who and what we are.
---ABOUT YOUNGBLOOD ROTH---
The piece was originally delivered within a series of talks and readings given by the author from his home in California and to the masters expository writing class at California State University, Northridge.
The author thanks Oberlin College, UCLA, USC, CSUN, Oregon State, Ohio State, Penn State, Georgetown, Michigan State, Kent State, Harvard, Yale, Purdue and other universities for distinguishing material in this series with a place on their web sites and in their classrooms.
In my twenties I shouted to those older, "Hear me!" In my fifties I speak calmly to youth, "This is how you may be heard."
Thank you, Y.B.R.
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