Fabric Meditation Books
I created these fabric meditation books during the beginning of 2020. The process began as a playful exploration of textiles, slow stitching and gathered nature and slowly grew into a deeply transformative and inspiring mindfulness art practice.
The practice of making each book helped me learn more about my busy mind, helped me sit with and process grief and many emotions inside my heart, taught me stillness and how to focus my mind to cultivate calm and peace. It was at this time that I was also beginning to explore Buddhist teachings and those wove lovingly through the whole creative process for me. The Noble Eight Fold Path, Zen Peacemaking, The 4 Immeasurables, wabi sabi principles, tonglen, the still point…these teachings were like one breath in as the needle and thread were one breath out.
One day at my art table, I was inspired to bury some of the fabric meditation books in my yard. The thought popped in my head, “Bury it.” I sat with that interesting idea. Then, while visiting my favorite local bookstore a couple of days later, I was in the Eastern Religion section and happened to open The Tibetan Book of the Dead. I turned to the introduction and read, “The Bardo Thötröl is one of the series of instructions on six types of liberation: liberation through hearing, liberation through wearing, liberation through seeing, liberation through remembering, liberation through tasting, and liberation through touching. Padmasambhava buried these texts in the Gampo hills in central Tibet, where later the great teacher Gampopa established his monastery. Many other texts and sacred objects were buried in this way in different places throughout Tibet, and are known as terma, “hidden treasures.”
I felt this immediate sense of awe, joy and synchronicity with what I just read and the idea I had to bury the sacred books I was creating from my heart and mind. It was such a beautiful moment, I wanted to turn to someone and excitedly tell them what just happened!
I went home and chose what book to bury and ended up choosing two that I made with secondhand linen, one that I dyed with indigo. It was important to me that I only buried books that were made with natural materials to honor and respect the earth. I walked outside with the books in my hand, took off my shoes, walked through the soft late spring grass and found a place along the edge of the woods on our property to bury the books. I kneeled down and gently moved the dirt with my fingers. It felt so good to touch the earth, like I was planning to plant a seed. It felt so good to hear the birds singing and feel the sun on my body as I silently knelt there at the altar of the earth. Then I gently placed the two books side by side in the shallow hole I dug and carefully put the dirt back over them. I placed a stone marker on top of the spot and quietly wished them well.
Over the next 30 days, as I went about my life, I would wonder what those books were doing down there. Were they getting eaten by curious, hungry bugs? Were the magical mycelium finding their way to the fabrics and interacting with them? Was the process of time and the unending life inside the soil acting as a creative collaborator, working with me to create a process and tangible objects of beauty? I loved pondering these things as the books were below ground.
On the 30th day, it was pouring rain. I walked outside without an umbrella, rain coat or shoes. I walked through our garden to the puddles in the grass, my body being drenched by the rain. I walked to the spot and knelt down and dug with my bare fingers. I felt the edge of one of the books and kept digging. I carefully pulled the mud covered books up out of the earth and let the pouring rain fall on to them. I walked with them over to a curly willow tree in our yard where it often floods during storms. I walked into the pool of water below the willow, bent over and washed the books in the water. I began to cry. Something in me was releasing. I had no words for what I was experiencing. I felt sorrow leaving my body and a connection to the earth that felt so healing. It was profound and gentle.
After the books were clean, I brought inside our house to my bedroom where my art table is. I laid them on a towel to dry. I opened them up and noticed how they had transformed in subtle ways…I could feel how special this process was to me. That the visual transformations were beautiful for me to see but equally was the power of the healing experience that the whole experience held. That was all within these precious books now.
I went on to bury others and some, I knew, needed to stay above ground and not be buried.
The whole experience taught me that I was revealing a new part of myself to myself through the creative process of making these books. I noticed that my intuitive ways of creating were actually deeply metaphorical for my own inner life. I was burying so much emotion inside myself that needed to be unearthed, honored, touched and held with love.
