Aspire To Play

dun_huan_ceiling.jpg

This water colour is by one of the monks, inspired by a ceiling painting in the Dunhuan caves. Interestingly enough the flying being is called an aspara. I’d like to think that she/he are there to help bring about an aspiration to play. In fact I’ve been pondering on the subject of play. That’s the merits of, the necessity of, the simple good fun of and above all, the release that play brings about. I’m talking about the spirit of play one sees in children and animals and sometimes in adults.

A thought I have of play, or image more like, is of a mumma Grizzly Bear seen in Montana sliding down a mountains side on her back with her cub on her belly. …and then climbing back up and doing it all over again, and again and again! And another image of a grizzly, not so into extreme sports, spotted on her back with front claws entwined with back claws, rocky back and forth, back and forth. Perhaps her teenage cub watched on thinking, Dah?

The above events were described in True Grizz by Doug Chadwick. An engaging book about Grizzly Bears in and around Glacial National Park, Montana.

Postings may be a bit patchy for a few days.

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4 thoughts on “Aspire To Play”

  1. I don’t know if you ever read the book “Homo Ludens”, another name for us “Homo sapiens”, which means the “Man who plays”…I had a whole seminar course in my undergraduate work with this theme. It was wonderful. Here’s a link to the book written by the Dutch philosopher in 1938 in case you haven’t heard of it before. Good reading!

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_Ludens

  2. Thanks for this post. I think it easy to forget to play as an adult. And much entertainment can sort of miss the play somehow. More importantly, I recognise that my practice could fall in to the ‘trap'(?) of cutting things out.

    Fab painting!

  3. It isn’t just grizzly bears! The Lancaster Canal is frozen over just now and when the ducks come in to land they skid along the ice and end up in an undignified heap. Then they get up, take off, fly round and do it all again! I’m sure they were having fun!

    Norman

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