Face to Face with Infinity

A Portrait of You …on any given day
A self-portrait, 05/09/2009, offered in love for Mariska:

…and Mariska offered: ‘We are the sum total of all of our experiences…’

Today is too grand for nostalgia. And anyway, experience reveals my
perceptions of self to be transient and flawed, a view full of noise and
distortion, revealing less than it conceals, and often impeding what
really matters –direct apprehension of Self.

Also, I am constantly rediscovering a deep rebellion against objectifying
whatever I Am. So I tend to treat characterizations of my Self, especially
my own, with increasingly skeptical regard.

We are free to Be, and we stand, like it or not, face-to-face with Infinity.
Thus, our great challenge – being present to the Mystery that is Life
instead of reducing our living to projects to be done, roles to be acted,
and positions to be held.

So in response to Mariska, I offer – we are not just the sum of our
experiences. Nor can we utter that which we are.

------------------------O------------------------

Living in this direction is carrying me constantly into ever greater
connection with those around me, increasing inter-being and love.

So I would claim we are the stewards of our experience, in trust and on
behalf of Universe, and all others.

------------------------O------------------------

Along these lines, embracing Mariska’s invitation to provide a more true
Self-portrait, I offer the below: a digitally rendered image of our Self.

The image began with a picture of a 10,000+ year old rock carving
discovered in the high Italian Alps, described as an evocation or paean
to the Sun God.

But I saw in that picture a timeless portrait of transcendence, created as
a prayer and a gift to all time by an ancient shaman expressing the
Freedom we all share. The image called me to re-create it in terms of my
own illumination and the experience of the current world, liberating it
from its stone setting, to live again in the colors of life, present in the
vibrant presence we term the World.

So, pointing-out our own true image, I offer - my self-portrait:

By David Armistead

Submitted 5.15.09