Post-Ceremony Process (5)… The Art

I have been told by multiple people, people from different walks of life, people with varied spiritual designations, people who have walked through my life in the last few years that I must Write, I must Write, that I am slated to be an author.

Well, I haven’t published any books yet, but I did pick up the painter’s pen – the paintbrush. Its not like I have ever learned any techniques of painting, I have never trained in art – never learnt how to paint, can’t stand watching YouTube tutorials, do not possess the tiniest sliver of patience for that – yet.

So, despite the fact that I have no technical knowhow and confidence (same goes for my god-given talent for photography), I have still chosen to spend a considerable time & a ton of my passion and ardor creating paintings in the post-2020-aya-retreat years.

I think I have been able to do this due to a basic familiarity with the tools – and the same goes for photography (Papa was often seen with different kinds of cameras, always clicking pictures of us, passed on a few sexy old-timey gadgets to me as well at a young age etc.) – the fact that I was briefly around brushes, canvases and the crazy-sacred-master-tools i.e. oil paints. It is because of my childhood art teacher, who handed me those tools that I have a basic comfort with them. I am not intimidated by the world of creation via canvas and brush. Thank Goddess for that!

Today I do not paint with oil paints simply because I live with dogs, whose fur I’m sure can be found even inside my lungs. Oil paints take longer to dry off, so the chances of a higher volume of fur landing on and settling into the paint are much higher with that medium. Also, no one has told me this, but I feel like the fumes that come off of turpentine, linseed and oil paints themselves may be harmful to my brothers (dogs). You see, Koko especially, my mother’s dog – he never leaves my side, and I have noticed that that is especially true for times when I am engaged in any creative activities e.g. painting, learning the keyboard, writing, reading. He just comes & sits close to wherever I am and settles in, lays there for as long as I am there – I wouldn’t dream of having him smell oil paint fumes hence.

But I do greatly miss working with oil paints. They exist at a whole other level of fluidity and creativity. Acrylics are my medium of choice at present. Since they dry off quite quickly, they can be very demanding and challenging. You’ve got to be quick on your feet, decisive, and ready to star over.

I have learnt to start over, after many mistakes, heartaches and disappointments, because of Acrylic Paints. The number of times I have painted over a half-done painting – I am very proud of. Acrylics, as my other formative life experiences, have taught me how to GIVE UP & GIVE IN.

GIVING UP can lead to divine interventions. When one is able to give up one’s attachment to the so-called ‘plan’ or ‘wish’ or ‘outcome’, sometimes magic can occur. (In fact, Now when I forget to practice “giving up” I suffer the most in my journey. And i frequently forget to, of course.)

Acrylic paints have made me very strong, mentally. I can start over now, without much wallowing. Of course, it used to be much harder earlier (and its still not entirely easy today). In the early days of painting, I would not budge, I would keep trying to make it work, to force myself on to a canvas, to have a fixed idea of where things must go. But then, I would get exhausted, out of ideas, out of enthusiasm. Until I had no choice but to start over.

Starting over can seem ominous, impossible, at first. It used to seem like I will never be able to recreate what I have already channelled on the canvas. This idea that the juice will run out (I still feel that sometimes, in my ’empty cup’ phase).

Acrylics have also hence taught me how not to take myself so seriously. And that they themselves have some sort of agency within them, a mind of their own. Sometimes when I paint, I can see that the colours are doing their own thing somehow. It feels like they have mixed a certain way, or are appearing a certain way – something that I definitely did not orchestrate. I cannot explain it except to say that THEY DO THEIR OWN THING. They LIVE THEIR OWN LIFE.

Another fundamental aspect of painting – the act of starting the first stroke on a canvas, a blank canvas – has taught me TRUST, FAITH. If I start with an idea, a mere ember of an idea, just a sliver of imagination, and i just begin – magic can take place down the line. I just have to begin, begin as many times as is needed. Just simply begin. And whenever I begin, the world is waiting with bated breath. To see what I can channel through my leap of faith. After I begin, I must keep faith. Faith that something will come about – there will never be nothing. Either a beautiful artpeace will emerge (that’s what I call my artworks), it might be smooth river flow, or a long frustrating bumpy ride, or valuable ‘mistakes’ – but there will never be nothingness stemming from it. If I have to paint it over, if I must start from scratch, I will, if I keep the faith.

Painting, like any other creative act is basically an act of faith. A leap. Sure, there are always internal expectations, our ideas of the outcome, how it should look, how it should appear – but ultimately since everything has a life of its own, it is futile to fight whatever sprouts/ comes forth.

There is huge life learnings here.

I am still barely absorbing and imbibing them in my journey.

So, one random day in September, 2020, while I was in my parental home in Kanpur, I spotted a large canvas that my mother had bought some time ago, to try pour-painting on. She never used it and it was sitting idly in a corner of the house. To my surprise my sister told me that she had a giant collection of oil & acrylic paints, sitting idly also. Then she showed me the insane amounts of paintbrushes she had as well.

Overnight I wanted to paint (after decades of not doing so). The first thing I wanted to paint was a flower of life because of the many coincidences around it in my life. I began with a leap of faith, unsteady hand, but within a few days I had this whole painting ready: and of course it was a tribute to my Ayahuasca experience.

Much to my surprise, my parents hung it up with pride of place in our living room within days of painting it. Ayahuasca had officially entered my family home, her presence casually accepted by “muggles”.

This one was an oil painting. I soon realised that with the abandon I use oil paints, the thick layers I use to bring out texture, my old love & comfort with the medium sparking up, invites my dogs’ hair to settle abundantly on the painting, mid-process. Also each time I used turpentine or linseed I wondered if its fumes would hurt my Koko, who was mostly stuck to my leg or painting table the whole time I would be painting. Even if I would be staring at my painting, mid-process, he would just be stuck to me.

After this one, I did another one with oils, but that was the line (yet).

This was inspired by being “in flow”, in “surrender mode” – surrendering to the waters of Life. Of course behind it is a core Ayahuasca ethic. Surrender, let go, flow and watch the magic unfold within & without.

This one was a smaller painting – the first acrylic piece of my life. It was a celebration of the Divine Feminine within that I was just beginning to recognise/ become aware of.

The second small acrylic piece, inspired by the smallness one feels when in the presence of Aya’s energy, not in a grudging egoic way, but in a “I’m thy tiny student, Mumma, please teach me what I need to learn”.

My father has been so encouraging to me throughout my exploration of art-making, and continues to be. He spends a few minutes every morning during his morning routine, walking around (I usually paint in our drawing room), looking at my painting-in-process whenever I am in the middle of one. He raises his eyebrows in praise, or simply just stares, sometimes making the odd comment. He and I are not on the same page, hell not even in the same book, but he indulges me still. He has no idea what a gift that is to me. It is love – his tolerance and co-existence with my “madness” & ‘ayahuasca-ness”. I am blessed. He & I were definitely born to each other to do this – to participate in this dynamic, at this stage of our lives. Its small things, but they are divine.

This painting has a lovely story, significant for me in terms of the story of my life being changed or written over in some ways, in front of my very eyes, with my active involvement in it.

This MDF board used to be covered with a wedding collage, of my ex-husband & I in various candid moments during our wedding. One October 2020 day in my Kanpur home, while I was trying to clear out some drawers to make more space for my art supplies (now acrylic-heavy, oil paints safely packed away) – I chanced upon this cringe-filled dust-covered wedding collage framed behind glass. It had obviously been removed from one of the walls and shamefully, regretfully hidden away from sight. After an initial bout of “yuck”, I instantly had a thought – what if I literally painted over it!? And so I did. I was heavily into thinking about the space vessels I had been shown during my 3rd ceremony, and the way they seemed to have communicated with my face and the canvas of my body. I thought of the secrets of the universe being slowly revealed to me, mysterious clues dropped on the streets and bylanes of my subconscious & conscious mind. That was it! I painted this feminine figure holding on to her secrets, with a promise of divulging them in good time on top of the wedding collage, I fit the dried MDF board back into the frame behind glass and hung it proudly on a wall in my room. All it took was a couple of hours. It was like magic. Like I knew what exactly to do, what to paint! Seriously this was a case of PURE URGENT FLOW. CLARITY. It just happened, I didn’t do much.

After over 3 years, after many many more paintings have found their place on the walls of our home, my room, this painting still hangs proudly just outside my bedroom door.

Starting September 2020, my sister and I had more or less started our own little unregistered dog-care non-profit out of our growing love for them. ‘Sisters to Dogs’ I called it. STD haha.

What had begun with just walking around the neighborhood, discovering new litters of pups taking birth around the bylanes, playing with them, watching them struggle, watching the new mothers struggle with survival and food needs etc, quickly grew into a 2-girl operation feeding and medicating/ vaccinating about 100 dogs in our neighbourhood. We literally were preparing and distributing food to a 100 dogs each morning between 6am and 8am – every single day, without fail. It was exhausting demanding work – emotionally & physically. Friends (lovely humans) from all over the country started to send us supplies, money for the effort. It was like magic was happening.

So many pups died in front of our eyes, walking out into traffic, getting attacked by other animals such as monkeys, other dogs. Pups who were born in the gutter, kept safe there by their smart mums drowned overnight in a sudden November rain, the morning of Diwali (I still remember howling at the side of the gutter while my sister urged me to keep going – she had already become hardened by watching this stuff take place over many years – whereas I was still new to this!) It was heartbreaking work – we named all of them, each new pup, each old dog and bitch. Aah! How my heart ached and soared at the time.

We continued this work for about 9 months, before we were physically depleted after contracting COVID in 2021. But of course, we never ran out of LOVE. To this day, I often go meet all of my dogs, out on the streets, living a lazy adventure. You see, I did the one thing I really wanted to do after experiencing this work – the female dogs suffer a lot in the endless cycle of giving birth, watching 90-100% of their litter dying in road accidents or at the hands of extreme weather or disease (PARVO etc). Their bodies are totally depleted and become malnourished, breasts hanging to the ground, desperately trying to feed their pups, they lose their fur, they look emaciated and don’t really get to enjoy their pups’ lives (as most of them inevitably die). Plus, any dog-lover-feeder gets told by passersby – “stop their population! you are just increasing their numbers, they are a nuisance” etc etc.

Over the course of months of feeding these dogs and loving them like family, I made friends with a lovely helpful government official, whose main duty was to “collect” dogs from their neighbourhoods, bring them to the local government neutering/ spaying facilities and drop them back to their respective territories. I was tentative about putting my faith in this person at first, but I observed the care and precision with which he collected the first-ever batch of dogs in my area, one day when I was looking after a new littler of pups in my area. Before I could stop him, he has caught a few dogs in his van and was heading off. I stopped him with fear and dread, worried about where he was taking them, the putrid stench of the dogs’ fear and the cacophonous screeches and howls bouncing around inside the dog-van.

Much to my surprise, he greeted me with a lot of respect. Apparently he had heard of me, seen my sister & I doing the work each day, he explained the whole official process that would follow with the dogs and assured me that the dogs would be back exactly where they had been picked off from exactly three days later.

He even showed me the register in which he notes down physical characteristics he notes down of each dog, and the exact area it has been picked from – so that there are no mistakes. I couldn’t believe that this system works – I mean my sister & I had given names to all our dog-friends to identify one from the other. But this guy was writing down physical markings, colour etc. – WHAT!!! there are many identical-looking dogs around. Anyway, he was indeed a man of his word. I saw him drop each dog back to his/her living spot 3 days later. I observed the female and male dogs for a week or so to see if there were any infections of adverse reactions in their bodies due to the quick procedures they underwent in such a stressful state. All was good.

Hence began my co-created effort with this wonderful human, Sujeet, from Kanpur Nagar Nigam, and we successfully got 70+ dogs neutered over 2 years. And the effect of that is still visible in the female dogs’ physical health. I am amazed at the thick fur, the sleep physique they all enjoy since. We had named a female dog Patches because the first things we had noticed about her (newly mothering & feeding a fresh litter of pups – all of whom drowned in that fateful November rain on the eve of Diwali) was the numerous bald patches on her body. Patches today has luxurious fur, no bald patches – 2 years post her spaying procedure. I am so proud of this. I am deeply proud of this.

Anyway, while I had started expressing myself on canvas with acrylics, I was doing this work day and night – it is a lot of hard work – prepping food, logistics, money, support for feeding 100 mouths with no prior experience. I wasn’t very wise in my effort, in the sense I still hadn’t dropped the habit of being the volunteer/ the martyr and wanting to do everything on my own. I was doing almost everything on my own – hence the painting process was going slow. When I wasn’t totally exhausted from all my physical efforts, I would paint. But it was one of the most fertile periods of my life. I cared for animals, received so many blessings and love from them, received support from the fellow human, had so many beautiful and ugly experiences, kept getting closer and closer to nature in my own way via the animals I was nursing – taking to the doctor – feeding – medicating – fostering. I cried so much during this time, helplessly wondering at the brutal everyday injustices of this endless-mindless-birth-and-mindless-death-of-these-little-beings. I grew so much as a human. I reluctantly understood that I am indeed the Divine Feminine, the divine mother. Mother to whoever would receive my love and care. I had shunned this part of me always. Even more so since the breakdown of my marriage. But I was a mother, helplessly hopelessly in love with life and its creatures.

I nursed many dark thoughts through this process. Every time I witnessed the next dead body of a tiny pup, I would lose my will to live, to carry on, I would feel the deep pointlessness of it all. I became angry with Mother Earth, with Ayahuasca, “why?” “why?”.

My sister, a champion in her own right, remained unfazed.

In the midst of all this, painting kept me going. In painting my visions and insights onto canvas, in those times, I was basically trying to relive magic, to re-understand and re-member that there is indeed a point in my existence – I may not understand it just yet, but there is. Painting kept me going.

One of the most remarkable paintings for me was this: My rendition of what an Ayahuasca ceremony feels like.

Making this painting, and being in flow enough to exactly be able to translate the creative vision I had for it – it grew my confidence in my ability to take more leaps in the painting realm. It compensated for the lack of confidence I was feeling in the animal-care realm, the feeling of hopelessness/ helplessness.

In hindsight, it was a balm. A band-aid.

The more time went by, the more paintings just kept spilling out of my fingers. It has been the single-most creative period of my life – since I partook in Ayahuasca ceremonies. It has been excruciating, ecstatic, disturbing, hope-giving all at the same time – as I suppose life is in general.