From Mushin:
How do the arts enter your everyday life? As mirrors for experience and meaning-making, they shed a bright light on the human-made world. They trigger us into physical sensations, emotions, streams of thought associations, memories, dreams etc. There’s much to be learned about our self-system and dharma as we engage various art forms.
One of the ways we practice in our daily round is by being aware of what makes up our experience of a piece of music, a show, a painting, a great meal, or a graffiti-covered train car. Not seeing with our ordinary eyes or listening with our ordinary ears, but with the eyes and ears of the heart. What effect do certain tones trigger in the physical body? What thought-associations or emotions begin when we hear tonal or atonal music? Pleasant? Unpleasant? How about the thoughts that come up when you hear a certain melody? How are you effected by hearing discordant or arhythmic music? We benefit from our formal practice all the time when we recognize what composes experience moment by moment and what its consequences are for how we show up for others and ourselves. What art forms are you enjoying this season?