Sandy Boucher has been practicing and teaching meditation in the Theravada tradition for thirty-five years. She leads retreats such as “Dharma and Writing”, “A Celebration of the Feminine Divine”, and “Meditation and the Spirit of Creativity” in the Northwest and the San Francisco Bay area.
She has chronicled the contribution of women to American Buddhism through her six Dharma books. Her new book, She Appears! Encounters with Kwan Yin Goddess of Compassion,offers stories and artwork presenting the Celestial Bodhisattva of Compassion Kwan Yin through Western eyes.
This talk is an excerpt from the longer daylong program entitled: Reclaiming Our Ancestral Heritage and Lineage, and Awakening Courage and Wisdom: Open to all self-identified LGBT*QI.
An inquiry as to why we are motivated to make things - poems, paintings, stories, plays. The lives of three contemporary artists are examined - two painters and a playwright, and the parallel between our mindfulness practice and the creative process is explored.
Sandy Boucher discusses five ways we keep ourselves from pursuing our writing or visual art or any other creative endeavor: 1) The fear of having nothing to say, 2) the fear of the Blank Page, 3) the fear of criticism, (4) the fear of failure, 5) the fear of finishing. With warmth and humor, she suggests attitudes and practices to help us soften and open fully to expressing what is important to us.
