Art Underground: Alissa Whelan
Posted on October 27, 2008
Walkabout Jones wants to feature artists of all kinds. Submit your paintings, graphic art, photography and drawings to “Art Underground” at walkaboutjones@gmail.com
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Is this a sign of the times? Struggling to make the rent. Putting our nickels and dimes and bills together to keep a roof over our heads. I wonder how many of us thought that something like this would be a possibility. Wonderful picture and extremely timely.
It’s a powerful photo, evocative of those from the first Great Depression in the 1920s and 1930s America.
The black-and-white sets the tone, in the art and in Life.
Sometimes, in Life, there are half-tones and nuances, options — ways-around and dodging-the-bullet. But other times, things stand stark and primal, light-dark, nothing in between and the precipice looms.
Of course, at those times, one can jump into the darkness of fear and depression or one can jump toward the light of hope.
After nearly 2 decades of travail, I find it is more supportive and successful, to opt for the light.
I constantly look toward bettering myself in every-any way I can — focusing on acquiring better health, new information, clearer Vision, building courage and confidence. One can say, why are you still struggling, if all that is supposed to be an answer?!
Well, I would respond, that our lives are meant to be a challenge.
Most of us don’t get a “pass”. In spiritual terms, we are here to learn Lessons. Universally, we grow from challenge and trial. We see the world in new ways. It allows us to become more responsive and more inclusive. We can problem-solve better, too.
I have to say I liked my decades of life which had smaller and fewer problems, but I know I am a much better person for the last few decades of constantly increasing challenges — financial, health, multiple job-loss. I am a different person. I feel I am being molded in a crucible of life.
I am lucky that my family has weathered it, together. The timely statement reverberates: “of those who are given much, much is also asked”.
People in the third world face these challenges every moment in their short-lives. People of the first world did not ever do enough to bring them up out of it, evenhandedly, and with dignity.
So, now, we see that the powers-behind-the-scenes, of this world, can take away “our” good-life just as easily!
The wealthy and powerful of Earth are not going to suffer financially in the turmoil they caused, but still, at some point, they do get caught in the larger Web, and as they are human, accidents, tragedy and death still happen to them, because that is beyond their control.
If that is their final-solution, they may not “learn” from those experiences. It’s often just being snuffed-out. They “blew” their chance, when at the top of the pinnacle-of-opportunity; they didn’t make the world “better”. They took constantly and unfairly, instead of giving or at least didn’t make an even-handed exchange.
So, in this wo/man-made economic tragedy, maybe we will find ourselves and our sense of community again. Maybe we’ll become able to define our purpose better. Maybe we will set new goals. When we had been so blessed, and then took it all for granted, then maybe we also lost our Vision or didn’t even try to create a better world. Now, we can change that error.
This is not punishment. It doesn’t work that way. Rather, it’s a cleansing process, sweeping away, so the new can emerge. We are now responsible to make the new — new and better selves and society. We will manage to create a new world which will side-track those so-called powerful people, whose unbridled selfishness created so much tragedy.
I think a better, more fair, world needs to be built. One where personal-best still counts; one where individual initiative is free to soar; where we care about each other, genuinely care, about other people and all of Life, as a steward and a witness.
One thing I have also learned, hang-on for dear life, and machinate and problem-solve as long as you can, as Jeff is doing here with his rolls of quarters, selling objects that in a new life probably will not be chosen again. BUT, also know when it is time to change course; then plan, and never look back. Make a clean break, without regrets.
Millions of people can create a better world now that they have woken-up. Stop being sheeple, even if the crisis has not hit you yet. Hop in and make a difference. Lots of people are hurting, but lots of people can brainstorm a new paradigm, one where there’s: less emphasis on the material world, more inclusion and fairness, support for the world of new ideas and creativity, time for happiness and the symphony of the heart and actions which bring the endless blessings of love.
This makes me laugh! I sure have been there before!
AMAZING eye and heart.
perfect!