Clearly, language is not just limited to words. We all express ourselves and receive information in a multitude of ways and all of these can be more or less violent, or more or less compassionate.
 |
| Language isn't just words. |
As a result, the discussion that Metta wants to engage in - and the space that we want it to create - isn't limited to words, either. But earlier tonight a friend - who is an artist among many other things - asked me to define exactly what makes "a Metta image"?
In one breath I want to say that I don't know, and that the purpose of Metta is to find out. But in the next breath I accept that guidelines are necessary, that some shape needs to be suggested.
On the Submissions page I have suggested that the process of creating work for Metta involves three steps. Here I want to explain those steps and see if they apply to creating images. The steps are:
1. Observe your experience without evaluating.
2. Feel your feelings, not your judgements.
3. Communicate your experiences and feelings in such a way that the reader is invited to comprehend exactly what happened and how it was for you (or your subject, character, etc).
2. Feel your feelings, not your judgements.
3. Communicate your experiences and feelings in such a way that the reader is invited to comprehend exactly what happened and how it was for you (or your subject, character, etc).
This process can also be defined by it's starting point. Metta, the word, is most commonly translated to mean "loving kindness". But one of the subtle points about metta is that it is not active. It is a feeling, not an action. I've heard it described as the feeling you have when you see a good friend. I think of it as a positive, hopeful, caring and generous attention. It doesn't blind you. It isn't a pair of blinkers or rose-tinted glasses, but it does allow you to see what is in front of you from a position of strength and safety. If you look at the world with the confidence that you look at a real friend then you are able to see it without fear of rejection or anger, without needing to be anyone else or to defend yourself or your point of view. At the same time, feeling safe, you are able to be generous enough to welcome the fact that there are other points of view. This is how the concept of metta connects with the first two steps mentioned above.
The third step is about skill in application and communication, but that, too, can be understood from another vantage point: the reader's experience. In a conversation where one person is sharing their experience, the listener can sometimes feel that he or she is being pushed around. Do you agree with me? Do you sympathise? Are you on my side or not? When he says, to give a simple example, that "that cake was disgusting" then you, the listener, find yourself unable to have any other opinion about the cake without hurting his feelings. Why? Because his feelings have been put inside the cake rather than inside him. He can't see the cake as an external object about which he has feelings. Instead it becomes an active thing that he blames for causing him distress. If you say, "I thought it was okay" you are not talking about the cake, either (or the person, place, situation or experience); you are talking about the source of his distress. No wonder there is a prickly, judgmental, fearful tension in this kind of conversation.
Importantly, thinking and communicating compassionately isn't about never evaluating, never making judgments for fear of being judgmental. (And no one wants to be thought of as judgmental. Discerning, maybe. Clever, certainly, but not judgmental. That's bad.) Compassionate communicators can still say, "I didn't like the cake." The trick is that they can also say, "Did you?" and the people with them all have every opportunity to say whatever they like about how they felt about the cake.
So that third step can only come after the first two. Once you have observed the experience as it is and located your feelings in you, then you can begin to try to use every bit of skill to communicate your experience to the reader, or listener, or viewer. You have to communicate it without expecting them to have had the same experience or to agree with your feelings, only to understand what happened and how it was for you. In Metta, the artists' job is to create the space for the viewer to step into, not to tell the viewer what kind of shoes they should wear.
 |
| A Metta image? |
The original question, however, was: "What makes a Metta image?" And it seems that all of this talk comes from descriptions of how to write or speak compassionately. But when I look back at the challenges and ask, "Can an image do that?" "Can a song do that?" the answer is still yes.
A "Metta image" - whatever it may actually look like - shares an emotional experience, but locates the emotion in the subject, not the object. The subject may or may not be in the frame. The subject may be the author, and might be real or fictitious. But the image (or song or film) allows the viewer to understand the subject's experience. The viewer comes away with a sense of what happened and how it was. The experience of seeing the image (or watching the film or listening to the song) offers viewers the opportunity to enrich their understanding and connect with another person.
I don't know if that helps, partly because I'm trying to explain in words what may well be a non-linguistic response to a non-linguistic experience. Perhaps I could simply say that a Metta-image looks great and makes you feel more connected rather than less. This might involve understanding pain or suffering or loss or grief, so it's not just about feeling good, but it is about feeling connected and expanded.
With love,
Tim
