No Fixed Position or War

Szukalski

Excerpt from Ajahn Sumedho's Dhamma book "Now is the Knowing":

"(...) The Buddhist way is a way of 'no fixed position'. There is no position that one takes as a Buddhist. That is a strange one isn't it? We are not asked to believe in Buddha, there is no for or against, no affirming or denying. We watch any attachments to Buddhism. We may think; 'Buddhism is the best!' Or; 'It's probably worthless.' From the ideal position we may think: 'I shouldn't have any opinions at all; one shouldn't have opinions or views.' But that is another opinion. Having no fixed position is not another position, but a reflection on any position. It is a great relief to the heart, really, not to feel that we have to know everything or have everything, and not to have to defend actions. I have found myself being very defencive about my way of life, trying to justify it, trying to make other people understand, trying to prove that it is right. Some opinions may be right, some wrong, but when we grasp them as absolutely right or absolutely wrong, then we are deluded by them."

You are It

Hopi Indian

Excerpt from Szukalski's book "Inner Portraits", regarding his sculpture "Hopi Indian":

"Some of the captions with these sculptures are remote, because I wish to smuggle into the reader's mind that ART is far simpler than the pseudo-profound creations of contemporary intellectuals imply."

"In many cases among the finest examples of Art, the creators were simple-minded people who expounded no theories about their profession, but merely followed their instinctive judgements like regular workers. I shall approach you as possible youths who long to create with impatient hands, but may have become paralysed by self-doubt because this epoch has built so many sterile notions. From my long life as a sculptor, I can tell you the REAL TRUTH, since my superfluous skills qualify me to call my opinions VALUABLE."

Beyond Knowing

Zdzisław Beksiński, Untitled

Excerpt from Loren Eiseley's book "The Star Thrower", chapter "The Hidden Teacher":

"(...) I once received an unexpected lesson from a spider. It happened far away on a rainy morning in the west. I had come up a long gulch looking for fossils, and there, just at the eye level, lurked a huge yellow-and-black orb spider, whose web was moored to the tall spears of buffalo grass at the edge of the arroyo. It was her universe, and her senses did not extend beyond the lines and spokes of the great wheel she inhabited. Her extended claws could feel every vibration throughout that delicate structure. She knew the tug of wind, the fall of a raindrop, the flutter of a trapped moth's wing. Down one spoke of the web ran a stout ribbon of gossamer on which she could hurry out to investigate her prey."