The Seventh Chakra

Today was pretty exciting! Z & I visited Arcadia Univ., a small liberal arts school in a northern suburb of Phila.. I think Z is ready to enroll right now: they've got majors in both art therapy and scientific illustration (two hard-to-find majors), a fabulous study abroad program, and the freshman dorm is an honest-to-gods CASTLE! In fact, it's modeled after the castle where the Harry Potter movies are shot, which is why everyone who sees it for the first time exclaims "Hogwarts!"

What more could anyone want?

N, meantime, had her first day of Jewish day camp, and loved it. She did mention that they had to read something in Hebrew, which I seriously doubt since she doesn't read a lick of it, but other than that, she says, there were no prayers & nothing Jewish about it - which I also doubt. Most doubtful of all, she insists that they served meatballs as big as her head. Anyway, it was a success, which is a good thing since it lasts two weeks.

I have one mandala to offer this evening. I did not work on any mandalas yesterday, as I was in the throes of the eighth day of a migraine (let me tell you, this makes me feel very grey and bleak when it carries on so long), and was attempting to avoid focusing my eyes much.

Today I completed the seventh (last) chakra mandala and began the eighth of Goodwin's chakra assignments, a combination mandala, but it's not done yet so I will have to wait till tomorrow to see how it will turn out. I rarely plan my mandalas ahead of time, and these chakra mandalas are no exception. I have begun each of them with a general idea of what I will do: I look at the symbol for the chakra and pull out my colored pencils and gel pens of the appropriate color (and maybe a contrast or blending color), get one or two ideas, and then begin from the bindu, the center. As the mandala develops, the rest of the design just appears naturally.

On the rare occasions when it just doesn't work - when it looks wrong, or when I get "artist's block," it means I'm not in the proper frame of mind. Which I think means that I'm in my left brain rather than my right, because this is very much a right-brain, meditative activity.

At any rate, here is my Crown Chakra Mandala.
~Namaste