In the Buried Treasure story, a person
called Lazy, goes in search of a new spring, that flow coming fresh of the
earth. The spring appears in the
rush of a runaway horse mounted by a spirit being. This event summons a hidden
depth from the searcher who responds by twirling, catching the bit in the mouth
of the galloping horse, and stilling the charge.
What a tale! The life spring, explosive horsepower, throbbing stillness.
Good stories charge us with translating the generative images into lived
experience. So I’m playing with translating the image shown above into one with
me and our horse, Leg’cy. Here goes:
When phenomenologists like Max van Manen focus our attention on “lived
experience,” we glimpse layers of meaningfulness, and sometimes we yearn to go
deeper. Playing with images offers one way to invite the movement toward our
buried treasures. To do this, I draft the moment in
the story (using Sketchbook Express) and then substitute real-life photos.
This composing supports my reflecting upon this moment in the story. I
actively wonder about how Lazy meets the horse and rider. Should I put a figure in for the rider or is it within the spirit of the horse? In translating across
story into experience, I’m wondering how I might find more horsepower, perhaps
from the spirit world flowing into everyday.
Buried Treasure offers revelation and unveiling of that which is most
precious. One of the veils consists simply in labels that are accepted. In Strangers to Ourselves, Timothy
Wilson’s “adaptive unconscious” articulates the way unexamined cultural biases
blind us. “Lazy” appears to be one of those projected labels used by a dominant
force to discredit the “other.” What if we’re veiled from seeing the runaway horse because we’re
turned away from the force, and what if revelation is just an imagination away?
How does the buried treasure translate into our lived experience? Might
it be that “sohbet,” the mystical conversation, flows from the other world as
much if not more so over morning coffee on our deck as it does in travel to the
holy shrine in distant lands? Public accolades might transport less of bliss than the
laughter of children, the blink of insight glimpsed in the eyes of adults
during a shared story.
I need frequent wake-up calls along the lines of Jung’s disclosure that it’s
the “inferior” function entering ecstasy, not the dominant. For me, this is to trust
“felt sense” enough to dedicate a ride with Leg’cy while giving the analytical
mind a rest. A priority given to photography and refining images in Sketchbook
Express or digital media production opens imaginations and removes blinders
imposed by hegemonic systems in the workplace, in pewed religions, in sold
sports. My dominant thinking function isn’t thrown away, but it gives way while
other knowings, perhaps more meditative ones that seem lazy to “higher-level”
scientific method, find insight, sometimes in a flash. Later, the rested
dominant function serves a valuable part in articulating the insight.
Buried Treasure serves to remind me of the way the discovery dimension moves into grace. We can enter liminal space, where the dominant parts dare
not venture, where boundaries of the world show rainbows of light in mist. N. Scott Momaday muses about the nature of story in the midst
of his beautiful volume, The Bear’s House: “Grace is the substance of story,
albeit invisible and remote. Grace is the soul of story./ It is a presence
without its mask./ Or perhaps a mask behind which there is no presence. . .
nothing, only silence, a perfect stillness” (p. 37).
Reflecting on this, I wonder: Peace in the Great Mystery. A buried
treasure: the gift of holding inspiration… **Spoiler Alert** I’m about to reveal part of
the Buried Treasure that might lessen the effect if you haven’t heard it. My
version of the tale is on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8E8wisYxU0. Diane Wolkstein’s version, “The Tatema,” is in Lazy Tales. I’ve traced
the print source further back to Wilson Hudson’s The Healer of Los Olmos and Other Mexican
Lore.
In the story, the one who meets up with the horse is given a buried
treasure; the gift aligns with a faith that God gives even if God has to push
it in the window. Before long, silver coins flow into their home, through Lazy’s
window. In my work/play with this
story, a deepened sense of the grace of life’s blessings flows through the
unveiling: the joy of horsemanship, loving the class I teach, storytelling, the
presence of beloved friends and family.
