Beauty: an escape from the material

There lies within us a desire to transcend our humanness. That humanness that is quite ordinary and even banal. That which smells, is sticky, is inevitable and very everyday humanness. We cover our odours, our blemishes and our imperfections, with attire, decoration and cosmetic products.

The most profound escape of our humanness however comes not in our trying to polish our stubby, warty meatbag of a body, but when we experience beauty. The more simple and worldly, the more profound. Sunsets, the way waves break on the shore, waterfalls that break the light waves in an opulent display of iridescence. It washes over us and leaves us quiet, lost for words and searching for more.

A feeling of being one with all that is. A peek into a world that is deeper than that which we can see on the surface. That initial sense of oneness with all being lasts for a moment.

It communicates a deeper truth, and we would give the world to experience it again. But it eludes us, even when we find the same exact spot at the same time of year, in the same conditions, which would theoretically display the same beauty to us. Even then, it is not the same.

Artists can offer a portal back to those places in their works of art, in their way of seeing. We can allow ourselves to be taken back. But it requires a great deal.

It requires something we can find hardest of all: surrender. We surrender to beauty, as a surfer surrenders to the waves. When we are not at the helm of our own consciousness we find our way back, with an overwhelming sense of great joy.

Take me back.