“Water Bottle” | Anthony Satori
“I traveled miles, for many a year, I spent a lot of time in lands afar. I’ve gone to see mountains, the oceans I’ve been to view. But I haven’t seen with these eyes, just two steps from my home, lies on a corn of paddy grain, a glistening drop of dew.”
– Rabindranath Tagore
“Pine Kernels” | Anthony Satori
“And life also belongs to God, for the actuality of thought is life, and God is that actuality; and God’s self-dependent actuality is life most good and eternal. We say therefore that God is a living being, eternal, most good, so that life and duration continuous and eternal belong to God; for this is God.”
– Aristotle
The more I ponder it, the more it seems that the essence of all life is inextricably linked to the phenomenon of consciousness. It is entirely possible, then, that consciousness may even be the very substance of life itself. This seems to be what Aristotle is suggesting, when he says, “The actuality of thought is life.” And therefore, it would follow that the ultimate form of life would be an eternal, ultimate, omniscient consciousness, i.e., God. We often think of the ancient Greek philosophers as ultra-secular, but here we have Aristotle rather comfortably admitting that not only must there be a God, but that God must be a singular living being, and that this God must be an ultimate, eternal, self-dependent manifestation of creative consciousness. And therefore, under Aristotle’s view of the world, God must also be the ultimate and most perfect manifestation of everything that is good. So, basically, Aristotle is saying, “God is good.” This is just one step away from what Jesus taught, that God is love, (love being the highest, most pure manifestation of good.) Therefore, it seems clear to me that the closer we get to attaining our highest consciousness – and manifesting our highest love – the closer we get to a more perfect connection and communion with God.
“Horse with Braided Mane” | Anthony Satori
“In a way, you’ve already won in this world, because you’re the only one who can be you.”
– Fred Rogers
“The Sabine Woman” | Anthony Satori
“Whether artists and authors ever live to see the dawn of their fame depends upon the chance of circumstance; and the higher and more important their works are, the less likelihood there is of their doing so. As a general rule, the longer a person’s fame is likely to last, the later it will be in coming. The general history of art and literature shows that the highest achievements of the human mind are, as a rule, not favorably received at first; but remain in obscurity until they win notice from intelligence of a high order.”
– Arthur Schopenhauer
“Coin-Operated Viewing Scope” | Anthony Satori
“Beauty… [offers] us a glimpse of an eternity that we should like to stretch out over the whole of time.”
– Albert Camus
“Spirit Hawk” | Anthony Satori
“We are like islands in the sea, separate on the surface, but connected in the deep.”
– William James
“Lights of Cannes (France)” | Anthony Satori
“For quality of life, it is better to err on the side of being an optimist and wrong, rather than a pessimist and right.”
– Elon Musk
“Glove on Stairs” | Anthony Satori
“The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”
– Albert Camus
“Girl with Ducks” | Anthony Satori
“You do not have to be responsible for the world you are in. Just do your part, as well as you can. That is enough.”
– John von Neumann
“Pinecone” | Anthony Satori
There is a word in Sanskrit: “atha.” It is pronounced “aht-hah.” It is the very first word Patanjali wrote in his ancient collection of the Yoga Sutras. It is a prayer, a request to the Universe for an auspicious, purposeful beginning to the endeavor at hand, and also for a sound, satisfying, successful conclusion to the venture. The prayer does not merely apply to the execution of the endeavor itself, however, but also to the quality of effect that it will have once it is released into the outside world. So, in essence, “atha” is a prayer that is meant not only to guide the virtuous manifestation of one’s creative vision, but also to guide and protect the product of one’s heart and one’s hand beyond its completion, onward into its future effect on the outside world. This makes it an especially powerful word, and a truly valuable and humble prayer to utter over any earnest endeavor of the heart and spirit. When I first discovered this word, I realized that, long before knowing the word, in my heart and mind I had always said such a prayer over the artworks that I create and the words that I write. How wonderful, now, to have a word for it!
As if this weren’t enough, however, there is another beautiful secret hiding within this word. And it is this: literally translated, “atha” means, “now.” It is a prayer meant to encompass the beginning, middle, end, and limitless future of an endeavor, and yet it is all contained in the word, “now.” How extraordinary to cover such a wide expanse of time in the simple “present” tense! In my interpretation, this indicates that this special prayer not only serves as a blessing over a particular venture, but it also contains a pure expression of something even bigger. It suggests that all events, all time, all actions and consequences are somehow also contained within one single, present, eternal moment. It suggests that our prayers, our connection to the Universe – to God, a Higher Power, the compassionate creative consciousness – is a connection that exists within a different realm, a higher realm, a place that exists outside of time and space. Here, everything that has happened, everything that is happening, and everything that will happen are all already existing, simultaneously. This is the spirit world. This is eternity. This is the mind of God.
And the beauty of this, for me, is that when we make a prayer like “atha,” we are praying with that part of our own Being which lives in this other mystical realm. When we pray like this, we are connecting with the spirit of God within us, and with our own inner eternal Self. And there is probably no activity that we can engage in which is more profound and more beautiful than this. I believe that any time we cultivate and nourish this connection that we have been given, we are further discovering our true nature, we are connecting more deeply with our own eternal Self, and we are making the conscious choice to remember our divinity.
Satori Circle | Art & Culture 