Mandalas create themselves. Anyone may use the mandala technique to create beautiful works which express the high metaphysics found in New Age Revelations. Mandala making is simultaneously a meditation technique, a divination and revelation technique, and a way to tap the hidden aesthetic potential in all of us. And it can be used for ceremonial Magick. To do Magick, first express your intentions symbolically with a layout of Tarot cards, then do the mandalas, for paintings, music, clothing or banners, and finally, do the mandala for the drama of the ceremony itself. This can be a major group project. A Buddhist mandala is a circle in a square, or a square in a circle, made in a divine trance. They have a center point perspective, rather than a horizon line and vanishing point. They also have symmetry in powers-of-two, i.e. bilateral, quadripartite, etc. C. G. Jung regarded any combination of circle and square as a mandala, even if the circle was sitting perched on top of the square. A Gothic cathedral rose window, a Renaissance church, and Bach's improvised polyphony are all mandalas. Mandalas can be defined procedurally, as any work of art which creates itself, without prior plan or design or theme, simply following the impulses of the inner self. If this improvisational procedure results in a creation with symbolic meaning, then the result is a mandala. So we have two definitions of the mandala, one in terms of form, and the other in terms of process, and it is impossible to settle exclusively on one definition or the other. In every artistic medium, we shall find some version of the circle and the square, and some form of improvisation. It is miraculous to me, someone who cannot draw a straight line, that in the unconscious process of making the mandala, something strange and beautiful and filled with symbolic meaning unfolds, in a style like nothing I've ever seen before. And all mandalas are that way. Not only does everyone have their own style, but each mandala has its own style. As for their meaning, it varies enormously. The last mandala I did turned out to be African shields and masks (when looked at from a distance in a sufficiently dim light). This meant I was hiding behind shields and masks and not opening up emotionally to a female friend who was visiting me at the time. In the mandalas of groups I have run, a troubled marriage stands out in one mandala, something that individual had never mentioned. In the mandala of an emergency room nurse, pride of the healer and resentment of authority was evident. One very quiet man, who had not said two words the entire semester, created the most beautiful mandala, expressing a life perfectly balanced between spiritual and domestic values. I envied him, and his wife, and told him so. A mandala can be a window into the soul, whether the mandala maker wishes or not. There are a number of books on mandalas, but none that relate to this chapter, since they are the works either of artists or of therapists. If an artist chooses to imitate the style of a mandala, the result may be beautiful, but can it be a revelation? And how can the mandala create itself if we must follow some Indian guru's teaching in our procedure? Remember, the Western Path rejects all gurus, guru-disciple traditions and cults. The Western Path progresses by a series of geniuses, who may be very imperfect as human beings. Indeed, we almost expect them to be a little cracked, or at least odd. But this is OK. It is easier to be a genius than it is to be a genuine guru, who is required to be a divine person, as well as possessing divine powers, knowledge and wisdom. This is such a difficult requirement that the intelligentsia of India regard gurus and swamis as frauds, or at least, self-deluded, along with their followers. The mandala technique offers a path to renewal of the higher arts, which have the power to transport participants beyond the mundane material world. It is part of a New Age, a golden age, a Renaissance of the Spirit. Go in Beauty. Live in harmony. The first rule for making mandalas is that there are no rules. Having said that, we can at least give a few hints for making drawn mandalas. Use a sheet of typing paper for each mandala, taped with masking tape to a hard surface, which can withstand the point of the compass. Get out all your kindergarten art supplies, compasses (for making arcs), small squares, or plastic triangles with a right angle, rulers, liquid crayola, wax crayola, colored pencils, poster paints, regular pencils and erasers. Let the mandala create itself. Take a break occasionally and get a fresh look at what is being created. At that point one may have a "gestalt" experience, as random lines and blotches suddenly come together as a recognizable object. Work to increase the recognizability, while eliminating superfluous lines. Some people primarily improvise with compass and square, first in pencil, with much erasing, adding colors in later. Others do it free hand in color with no erasure, and who can say which is the better mandala? If there is a rule to making mandalas, it is to let it create itself. Do not attempt any preconceived design. Twentieth century painting has had a liberating influence on mandala makers. A house in a mandala may be a Picasso house, showing multiple perspectives at once. We are not stuck with a horizon line and a vanishing point, or realistic portrayal of objects. Objects may be symbolic doodles, like the elements in Navaho sand paintings. Anything is possible. Interpreting mandalas is far more difficult than making them, and may take overnight. Yet it is essential, because of the revelations contained therein. Everyone can be their own source of revelation. It is not necessary to run after trance channellers or gurus. In the groups I've run, no one could interpret mandalas but me. But, of course, they did not have the benefit of "The Alphabet of Symbolism," or years of study. Try turning it this way or that, and looking at it at various distances, in various lights. Take your time. Sleep on it. In the morning, a sudden gestalt experience may occur, just as a person is suddenly recognized at a distance. Or it may remain a doodle. The revelation may be highly personal, instant psychoanalysis, or it may contain high metaphysical themes. How do we know it is true? If it is highly personal and the mandala maker recognizes the truth of it, fine. If it contains universal metaphysical themes, then we expect reproducibility, in the sense that we expect to find the same themes in everyone's metaphysical mandalas, and the same themes in mystical experience. This is the beginning of the science of metaphysics. In music, we make a distinction between the creation of a piece and the performance of the piece. In fact, the same distinction now arises in sculpture, where the artist may do a small scale sculpture in clay and at the shop it will be reproduced on any scale in marble or bronze. I apply this same distinction to all the arts, even if the creator and the performer are one and the same person. The creation and the performance remain separate and distinct acts. A drawn mandala is made on a piece of cheap typing paper, held down to a hard board with masking tape. While creating a mandala, we don't worry about staying within the lines. Mandalas can be quite sloppy in the creation. But having recognized the elements and interpreted them, why not create a polished work of art? I have never seen an ugly mandala. But try to imagine it done on canvas or watercolor paper in a larger size, carefully painted in acrylics, oil, or watercolor. An artist could be hired to do this. That is the performance of the piece, suitable for framing and hanging on the walls of your house. |
