Opening your heart … it’s more than just a clever series title, and it’s more than just being about activities; it’s about people, too. The more your heart is opened, the more you’ll be sensitive to others: their pain, their joy, their lives.
I was thinking of this last week when I was out in San Jose at a conference and took an afternoon off to tour the San Jose Museum of Art. There was a special exhibit there by Los Angeles-based artist Camille Rose Garcia, and I have to say that I was blown away by her work — not just her huge disturbing acrylic-and-glitter on wood paintings, but the narratives that accompanied them.
This is a woman who has opened her heart to the darkest parts of the corporate-run, terrified, superficial society that exists today in the United States, and yet turns from those images with hope. Some hope. A little hope.
And that’s what opening our hearts really is, I think: all about hope. About faith. About believing that we can make a difference in the world, and acting on that belief. Sometimes we just need to be confronted with that reality along with the other, darker reality of the world as it is now, to see that all isn’t lost.
The major charity that I and my company support is Doctors Without Borders, and I think every day about their mission — to seek out the worst places in the world where no one else wants to be, and to be there. It’s a daunting task, that can only be accomplished if enough people open their hearts.
Look at the work of Camille Rose Garcia. Examine the efforts of Doctors Without Borders. And ask yourself what your heart is telling you to do, today.
Jeannette Cézanne
www.jeannettecezanne.com
Posted by: — jcezanne
|
