I'm gonna try to make this one kinda short today, since I'm writing two posts today for the past few weeks in order to catch up to 'C' for tomorrow.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. There's a lot of different definitions, opinions, and ideas about beauty, but there has to be some way that we can relate beauty to the spiritual, right?
Beauty is flowers.
Absolutely. Even from a metaphysical perspective, beauty is important. The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer has done extensive writing supporting his concept of the Will, which he considers to be an underlying existence that moves everything that we do, in cycles of desire and obtainment, desire and obtainment. Aesthetic contemplation, he says, quells the Will for the moment, allows us to be free of desire, and puts us at temporary peace. This is because art is our way of attempting to make pure concepts into a material form of understanding, and thus it soothes us.
Beauty is simplicity.
We actively seek out beautiful things. We strive to look beautiful ourselves, wear beautiful clothes, make our hair beautiful, fill our homes and altars with beautiful things, treasure beautiful works of art, and listen to beautiful works of music.
Beauty is an old photograph of siblings.
There are several theories for why we do this. The first is that we wish to give pleasure to ourselves or to others, and beautiful things give us pleasure. That's a simple explanation.
Beauty is juicy and tasty.
Another reason, and my favorite one so far, is that we may seek out beauty is because beautiful things inspire us to make other beautiful things, in a cycle of creation that makes us feel like we are touching the divine, touching our ancestors, touching the world, touching all of these things that led to our own existence and creation. Beautiful things inspire us to the creativity process. Creativity is divine in and of itself. Creation of beautiful things celebrates the universe, god, goddess, and oneness within ourselves.
My dog doesn't actually meditate. I just like this picture.
Some modern religions try to quell the beautiful things in life. Muslims (and technically Christians too, with the 2nd Commandment) are forbidden from outright creating art, and so they (cleverly) use their aesthetically-pleasing Arabic script to create beautiful works of art. While they find the way around this, it still is a philosophical advising against attachment to art and beauty.
Sometimes, beauty is desolate.
Christians are often encouraged to not be too attached to earthly, beautiful things, as they will not last. I find that delicateness, the ability to be destroyed, and the idea that beauty will not last forever is exactly a reason to treasure it while it lasts. Even if you create the most beautiful artwork in all of the world and burn it, then perhaps its purpose was to only be enjoyed by you. Perhaps it is the more beautiful in that you alone have experienced it. (Just -- don't burn or destroy other people's artwork unless you've asked them first, cause that's kind of mean.)
Most of all, Beauty is Nature.
Enjoy beauty everywhere. Here are some suggestions to add beauty to your circles:
--Artwork Meditation. You can use someone else's artwork or your own as a meditative tool. Stare at the artwork from several distances. What do you see? Are you looking at the whole picture, or zooming into details, or switching back and forth? What can you learn from this artwork, and from its beauty? What does it make you feel?
--Music. Incorporate recorded music into your ritual, if you haven't already. There's a LOT you can do with this.
--Create your own artwork. Who says you can't sculpt, paint, watercolour, sing, play instruments, collage, or even randomly sling paint onto a canvas in circle? Create art with the deity.
--Bodypaints. Naked. It's a lot of fun, and you can put a lot of temporary beautiful things on your beautiful body! Especially fun when done with your partner.
--Physical Objects. Sure, you've used flowers, gemstones, beautiful statues or figurines, foods, beads, feathers, and other such objects ritually before. Why not create a ritual still life with them? Pop out your camera, and take some shots, or just take a mental picture.
--Gingerbread Yule House? That sounds pretty awesome to me. Pretty looking, AND pretty tasting. And, yes, flavors and scents are beautiful too.
I'm sure that there's more things you could think of, or more things you already do, so go do something beauteous today! Celebrate your divineness with beauty. DO IT NAOO!!!
Love,
<3 Sapphirescent <3
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