Kelly Summerford with Susan Courtney

Kelly Summerford, a member of the Harrisburg City Council, listens as Susan Courtney explains her art work, "Liquid Mermaid". Susan Courtney's art was accepted into the 83rd Annual International Juried Show of the Art Association of Harrisburg. The gallery is located at 21 North Front Street in Downtown Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Please see: http://www.suejay.com

Peace of Mind

"Being in the world and not of it" is merely stating that when you are in the midst of turmoil, you can remain unaffected, while the turmoil swirls around you. That is the key. You do not have to buy into the illusion of the drama going on outside of you. You do not need to allow the negative energy to enter into your space. You have control over whether or not you allow it to come in and affect you. You have tremendous power and control. Of course, some of us have self-inflicted dramas that we create from within and end up projecting outside to those around us. Being consciously aware of what is going on outside of you and inside of you is the beginning to the mastery of your domain.

Energy Has Unity

Everyone has a different perspective on reality. Yet, reality is all connected. All energy has unity. There is a connectedness that we are challenged to perceive. But we see existence from a million or billions of different perspectives.

From a philosophical perspective, there is one totality of existence that is sub-dividable. For thousands of years, this has been recognized.

In First Corinthians, Chapter 12, Verse 12, Saint Paul said, "The body is a single entity, though it is made of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body."

In the Bhagavad Gita 11.7, it says, "Everything—moving and nonmoving—is here completely, in one place."

What is thought of as the authentic materiality is the result our experiences. Our past has shaped our present. Our reactions to everything that occurs is the result of our spontaneous adaptations to life as it unfolds before us.

Our creation of our present and our future is the result of thousands of interactions that subtly combine in our memory.

In fact, our perception of the present always lags behind the actual present. Even if just for a short period, there is a delay while the rods and cones in our eyes translate what light has been reflected from other objects (and energies). Then, that image that has passed into our eyes is forwarded to the brain to be compared with millions of possibilities to construct what we see in front of us.

One of the theories of why we have trouble remembering incidents from our infancy, is because during that initial period of existence we are building up the repository of data in our brains. There is not enough data stored in our baby brains to be able to have adequate comparisons to classify what we are seeing. Therefore, the memories are inadequately stored.

As we mature into adulthood, our memories are interpreted through the filter of our emotional response to stimulus. The mental preconceptions of what we believe to be real, is based on our understanding of what we think is real, and may not even be close to reality itself.

The arts bring all this together. In fact there is a deep human need for the arts, visual and auditory. Through the arts, we begin to understand the nature of who and what we are.

The quest for understanding and for interpreting what I perceive has been a life-long passion for me. To see some of my latest visual arts please see my website, http://www.susancourtney.com