To Exist As An Orchestra

The 4 horsemen of existential nirvana: Body, Brain, Heart, and Conductor

The Conductor

For years I've been trying to make friends with my body. I'm essentially an octopus - 'soft' or 'flexible' doesn't begin to describe it. Between a connective tissue disorder and various forms of chronic pain, I work hard to maintain a basic level of stabilization for this exceptional bag of liquid.

Brain and Heart have been told repeatedly (by me) that they need to fix Body. Heart usually goes silent. Brain is tired from doing all the work. Body keeps hurting. No-one really wins.

Brain talks strategy for Body with friends, searching for the next thing to end up in the supplement graveyard. Collecting diagnoses like it’s a fucking hobby.

One of these delightful humans asked me recently "What would that(physically) look like?" [to have all 3 in harmony]. And like a lightning bolt it hit me:

"OMG. MY ART. IT WOULD LOOK LIKE MY FUCKING ART!"

Disparate, competing elements, somehow creating a cohesive image. Body, Brain, and Heart, harmonizing on the canvas. I thought about this for an afternoon and had several realizations:

The Circus - 2023

1. When paint the fluid, organic lines in my work, I often imagine them as my limbs. I've been trying to mimic how it feels to exist in this octopus of a body.

2. The chaotic interconnecting geometry is undoubtedly Brain. A factory with a twist - the factory in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, for example. There's most definitely a slew of Oompah Loompahs performing trickery. Lots of busy work. Very loud. Very demanding. Has a lot to say in staggering detail. Yes. This is Brain.

3. Heart seems to be an enigma and not always present. They're what I've been chasing with skills this past year because my visions of them allude me - but when they do appear, they're the primary shape/form. The main event. Oddly, the only ‘realistic’ thing I’ve drawn of my own volition, was a god damn heart. Hmmm, ok.

In reality, Heart is not some epic centre piece pulling it all together, instead, Heart swings between feeling like a bag of Mentos in a bottle of Coke* and a lifeless rock (like, not even any moss on this rock, ya hear me? Just D.E.A.D). I seem to be painting what I'm trying to find - the key to making the rest of the piece (aka me) work cohesively.

*If you've never seen this effect...look it up for a chuckle.

Immediately, I couldn't help but realize I've been treating Body, Brain, and Heart as if they exist in a vacuum as individuals rather than part of a whole.

Me in 3 parts & as a whole, as The Conductor.

Queue The Conductor (which turns out is me). The 'whole'. The one that gets everyone harmonizing. They tell the horns when to shut the fuck up and allow the strings to soar, they ramp up the timpani and tone down the flutes. Everyone gets their solo while being backed by a god damn orchestra. Magic.

Perhaps most importantly though, The Conductor signals everyone to tune. Ya know what a symphony sounds like when the sections of an orchestra only tune to themselves? Block-your-ears-and-run-for-the-hills-horrendous. Stamp-out-my-eyes-with-a-spoon-agonizing. Lay-back-and-think-of-ANYTHING ELSE-harrowing.

I'm not sure what will come of this new info yet, the knowledge itself feels like a profound leap in my ability to care for myself. Seeing them as an already established unit rather than pieces of a puzzle I need to put together has already lifted something in me.

I'm always eager to hear from others about how they go about generally existing - I'd love to know, how do you view the relationship between your Brain, Body, Heart? Do you see yourself as a Conductor of sorts?

How do you balance, integrate, harmonize, jazzercise, synchronize, optimize, supersize, hypnotize, them?