When I was young, I used to love to draw. Although I never actually took any formal drawing classes, I enjoyed drawing and spent a lot of time at it up through high school.
I was particularly impressed by the drawings of Frank Frazetta, whose illustrations could be found in the famous Martian novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs, stories which I read and re-read -- you can see a drawing I made in the 1980s imitating an illustration by Frank Frazetta found in the 1970 hardbound Nelson Doubleday edition of A Princess of Mars (on page 55 of that edition) reproduced in this previous post.
Above is a drawing I did more recently, in May of this year, based on an illustration by Frank Frazetta found in the 1973 Nelson Doubleday hardbound edition of A Fighting Man of Mars (part of a two-book volume which also contains The Mastermind of Mars, and features illustrations by Frazetta -- this one on page 138 of that edition).
I also enjoyed playing piano and did take formal lessons up through about fourth or fifth grade, when I stopped.
Recently, I've had the urge to return to both of these areas of my life which I had neglected for decades, and I found myself wondering why I had ignored them for so long.
In light of some of the lessons that I have learned from the ancient myths, I am now starting to realize that in response to the pressures and norms of integrating with society (and as a defense against the kind of teasing I encountered as a very introverted middle-schooler and early high-schooler), I had basically constructed a persona beginning about midway through high school and even more so once I went off to West Point and the military which (as the egoic personas we create tend to do) actually cut me off from aspects of my own self -- including pastimes like art and music which used to bring me so much pleasure.
To illustrate the effects of societal pressure resulting in the creation of a persona or "egoic self," here are two photographs from my days at West Point, the first showing me (in the center) and my classmate Jerome P. (on the left of the photo) performing our table duties under some pressure (from the upperclassman on the right side of the photo) to conform to the norms and standards of the "fourth-class system" as it existed in the winter of 1987:
And below is another photo of me, less than three years later, now as an upperclassman tasked with dealing out exactly the same type of pressure to conform to the incoming cadets during the first and most stressful half of "beast barracks" during the summer of 1989:
And while the overt and somewhat extreme levels of pressure and conformity found at West Point and expressed in these photos may seem different from other kinds of pressure exerted elsewhere in society, in point of fact every one of us encounters varying levels of pressure to conform beginning when we are still just infants, as a necessary part of integrating into the culture around us -- and this results in the creation of a "persona" (a word derived from an ancient Etruscan word meaning "a mask") which is a kind of defense mechanism which we create and which helps us to interface with the world around us, but in doing so excludes our authentic self, in an attempt to not get hurt.
Teachers and healers such as Dr. Gabor Mate and Dr. Peter Levine explain that trauma, especially in early childhood, can and does result in the separation from the essential self.
In a talk he gave in 2015, which is linked in this previous post, Dr. Gabor Mate said these powerful words:
We live in a world that rewards us for being inauthentic, and punishes us for being authentic. And we live in a world, and a culture, that seduces us from our true selves with every possible blandishment, reward, and promise of fulfillment through artificial means. [. . .] And the other problem, as Alma says, is that your mind, your egoic mind, always wants to invalidate your essence. Because the egoic mind develops as a replacement for the essence. When essence shows up, the mind is threatened -- the ego is threatened. So it wants to fight back.
Both Dr. Mate and Dr. Levine explain that we often do not even realize that we are disconnected from our essential self.
So for many years, I didn't really even think much about drawing or playing piano, and now I am rediscovering how much I enjoy both of them, and this may or may not have anything to do with the process of being disconnected from the authentic self (a process which nearly each and every one of us goes through, according to the world's ancient myths, which devote a great deal of attention to this vital subject), but I thought it might be a helpful illustration for some -- and it certainly is a helpful illustration for me!
And, as I think about it, both art (whether in the form of drawing, or painting, or sculpting, or pottery, or weaving, or photography, or many other media, too many to list here) and music were explicitly described as gifts of the gods in the world's ancient myths, with specific gods and goddesses presiding over these important gifts.
I am convinced that both art and music can serve as very powerful and very beneficial pathways for transcending the egoic mind (which we construct as a "replacement for the essence") and for reconnecting with our essential self.
Indeed, if art and music are described as belonging to the gods themselves, we might suspect that their very nature transcends the coils of this seemingly-material realm which constantly threaten to drag down the essential self and bury it forever.
Their very purpose is to elevate and to transform, and we have very clear surviving examples from Greek myth in which the patron god of music (Apollo) and the patron goddess of artistic depiction in weaving (Athena) exact judgment upon mortals who subvert that purpose, in the story of Arachne (discussed in Star Myths of the World, Volume Two) and in the story of King Midas (discussed in this previous post).
I am convinced that music, along with other forms of art including drawing (as well as various sports, and spending time in nature, and of course the practice of ancient disciplines including meditation) enable us to loosen the grip of the egoic persona and its layers of doubt which have been built up over years and years, and to connect with our essential self who is actually always present and waiting for us.
Below is a video I made today of me working on Jon Lord's famous second keyboard solo from "Burn" (1974). I'm not satisfied with it yet, and still working on adding the left hand to this one (which is particularly challenging), but I present it here as part of the discussion of the way that music can be a pathway for cutting through the "doubting mind" and the persona we build up as part of our integration into society, and for reconnecting with our essential self.
Playing this particular solo, and any other music really, requires quieting the constant internal narrative and doubts and questions which characterize the "egoic mind" (personified in the ancient myths in figures such as "Doubting Thomas," or Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita who is filled with doubts prior to the battle of Kurukshetra, or Psyche in the story of Eros and Psyche, who lets her doubts run away with her).
You can hear some spaces in the segment below where doubt creates a moment's hesitation between musical phrases. But the "descending triads" which begin at 0:08 in the video are pretty much impossible for me to play at that speed if I am thinking at all about what others who are listening might be thinking, or thinking at all about "not making a mistake." I personally have to be "in the zone" to hit those descending triads, so I'm happy about how that turned out at least (it doesn't always happen).
If you want to hear a truly inspired performance of this particular solo, I highly recommend Pierre Lelievre (here).
But for me, the return to drawing and to playing music is a return to a part of my self that I had set aside for many years without even really thinking about it -- and (even more disconcerting) without even realizing that I was missing it.
I am convinced that the ancient myths point us towards reconnecting with our essential self, from whom we become estranged through the pressures and trauma of this earthly experience, but who is always present and available and waiting for us to come back -- and I am also convinced that the myths imply that through this reconnection, we begin to become attuned to and aware of the wider realm of the gods.