Latest / STOPTIME: Live in the Moment. / Synchronicity in Santa Fe: Channeling Transformation
Transcript
- 0:23Lisa Hopkins: Hey there.
- 0:24Lisa Hopkins: So you haven't heard from me in a little over a week because I was unplugged and spending some time in Santa Fe with one of my mentors.
- 0:38Lisa Hopkins: I've never been to Santa Fe, new Mexico, but it was truly a sublime experience and there's something I discovered there, among other things, that I'd love to share with you.
- 0:53Lisa Hopkins: I arrived at the event on Monday evening and had two days to myself before the actual event began.
- 1:07Lisa Hopkins: Had two days to myself before the actual event began, but for me the event truly began the moment I got on the plane.
- 1:19Lisa Hopkins: I arrived at night and it had been a long day of travel, so it wasn't until Tuesday morning that I woke up and got a sense of where I was.
- 1:30Lisa Hopkins: It felt liberating to be all alone in a new place which was mine to discover, and that I had plenty of time to think about what lay ahead for me with my mentor.
- 1:46Lisa Hopkins: So I got ready that morning and out I went.
- 1:51Lisa Hopkins: I was quite hungry because I hadn't eaten all day the day before due to great connections which didn't allow me eating.
- 2:02Lisa Hopkins: So, double-edged sword.
- 2:04Lisa Hopkins: Like most of us, in anticipation of coming to this new place, I did have some preconceived notions, and I think the distinction between preconceived notions and expectations is an important one.
- 2:22Lisa Hopkins: Although I didn't actually expect anything of the place.
- 2:27Lisa Hopkins: Although I didn't actually expect anything of the place, I did kind of again, due to my research, have these preconceived notions about what it would look like, what it would feel like, and so I observed myself as I walked out the hotel room and into the hotel lobby and then out the lobby of the hotel.
- 2:48Lisa Hopkins: I observed myself looking around, trying to find something to grab onto that matched that preconceived notion I had of what Santa Fe was supposed to look like.
- 3:03Lisa Hopkins: Isn't it funny.
- 3:05Lisa Hopkins: I wasn't disappointed, but because it was a new place and because I only had my research, I think it's perfectly natural to want to grab onto something that matches what you know or believed.
- 3:22Lisa Hopkins: I took a deep breath and let any of those thoughts or notions go and I made my way into town and the closer I came to the center of town, where the square and the vendors and the architecture and the colors and the sun and the blue sky, it all enveloped me and it didn't matter anymore what I thought it would be, because it just was in this moment.
- 3:59Lisa Hopkins: And what it was, let me tell you, was sublime, was sublime.
- 4:07Lisa Hopkins: There was just this energy, this feeling of deep-rooted history and connectivity and spirituality, and art and color and stories.
- 4:21Lisa Hopkins: About every single thing you looked at.
- 4:23Lisa Hopkins: It was phenomenal.
- 4:26Lisa Hopkins: So you remember I said I was hungry.
- 4:30Lisa Hopkins: Well, I did have my coffee, but the hunger subsided because the hunger for exploration was stronger than my hunger in my stomach.
- 4:46Lisa Hopkins: And so I went forth and I explored and I wandered, I roamed in and out of gardens and galleries, through churches and sculpture gardens to this particular adobe building which happened to be the New Mexico Museum of Art.
- 5:10Lisa Hopkins: It was such a beautiful structure and I took a picture of it from across the street.
- 5:16Lisa Hopkins: I noticed that there was a sign up on the wall, but I couldn't read it, so I moved closer.
- 5:26Lisa Hopkins: I think it's important to note that I've really been thinking about how I've talked about my life as a mosaic, a combination of all the beautiful pieces of my life that have come together to make this beautiful whole, and I've always identified with that.
- 5:45Lisa Hopkins: But lately I've been having this kind of inner knowing, this sense that maybe it's time to melt, to change the form of the mosaic, to make it more fluid and less separated by grout, like mosaics are the grout in our life, if you will Less siloed, more all-in-one and less distinguishable except when really all mixed in together.
- 6:22Lisa Hopkins: So I'd been kind of thinking a lot about this.
- 6:25Lisa Hopkins: So I'd been kind of thinking a lot about this, and as I neared the sign on the side of the museum maybe it's no surprise, but the artist that was exhibiting the title of the exhibit was To Make, unmake and Make Again I was profoundly drawn in.
- 6:49Lisa Hopkins: When synchronicities like this happen in my life, I suddenly become very laser focused, and so I knew that I was going into the museum, and into the museum I went and I spoke to the docent at the door, who pointed me in the direction of this particular exhibit, which was my number one thing to see.
- 7:16Lisa Hopkins: She pointed me to the left and said go that way.
- 7:20Lisa Hopkins: And so I did.
- 7:21Lisa Hopkins: And I walked into an area where there was a well, to me it looked like a theater, but I'm guessing it was a chapel of some kind and there was a stage and it was quite lovely.
- 7:37Lisa Hopkins: And I breathed that in, just recognizing how comfortable I felt.
- 7:42Lisa Hopkins: Nothing was going on there.
- 7:43Lisa Hopkins: In fact some of the technicians were working on something.
- 7:46Lisa Hopkins: Well, the exhibit clearly wasn't there.
- 7:50Lisa Hopkins: So I wandered upstairs, which was the only way you could go beyond going outside again.
- 7:55Lisa Hopkins: So up the stairs I went and I was on the balcony of the theater and again I looked down and smiled, grateful for all the many, many years I've had behind the scenes in my theatrical life.
- 8:10Lisa Hopkins: But the exhibit was not there.
- 8:14Lisa Hopkins: It was nowhere to be found.
- 8:15Lisa Hopkins: So I looked to my right and there was a door that was ajar.
- 8:22Lisa Hopkins: So I passed through.
- 8:30Lisa Hopkins: I found myself on the roof.
- 8:31Lisa Hopkins: The sky was vast and blue and the sun bright.
- 8:38Lisa Hopkins: There was a kind of rooftop plaza, not meant for people, but there I was, in an area where perhaps I was not supposed to be.
- 8:51Lisa Hopkins: I took a photograph, of course, and it occurred to me that this is a pattern in my life passing through doors that are ajar.
- 9:04Lisa Hopkins: In any case, it was getting warm and I really did want to see the exhibit.
- 9:10Lisa Hopkins: So there was a door on the other side of the roof and I thought well, I'll go through there.
- 9:16Lisa Hopkins: Maybe that's where it is.
- 9:17Lisa Hopkins: Keep in mind that that door was not ajar.
- 9:21Lisa Hopkins: So as I made my way over there, being careful not to fall through the roof, which was a little softened by the sun, fall through the roof, which was a little softened by the sun, and when I reached the door, the door was locked.
- 9:40Lisa Hopkins: The door on the other side was locked.
- 9:44Lisa Hopkins: I worried for a split second that I might get caught or, worse yet, locked up there in burning bright light of the Santa Fe sun, and so I went back the way that I came Back through the theater and down into the museum, eventually finding the exhibit which I'll tell you about in a moment.
- 10:09Lisa Hopkins: Finding the exhibit which I'll tell you about in a moment.
- 10:17Lisa Hopkins: I noticed later that in the photo that I took that there is a ladder lying down on the ground on the roof, where I stood and on my journey to integrate all of me into my work.
- 10:27Lisa Hopkins: The metaphor intrigues me.
- 10:29Lisa Hopkins: The ladder was lying down between an open door and a closed door.
- 10:37Lisa Hopkins: Interesting, I'll continue to explore that.
- 10:44Lisa Hopkins: The fact that I was invited to go back down through the theater, back through my history, back through that part of me to the exhibit, was not lost on me and this idea that it's not always about going forward and forging and moving ahead and leaving things behind or keeping them separate with the grout.
- 11:10Lisa Hopkins: The first sign that I saw in the exhibit described the artist as a potter, scholar, writer, collector, curator, publisher, dealer, maker.
- 11:27Lisa Hopkins: I smiled as I thought about how boldly it said each of the things that he was.
- 11:37Lisa Hopkins: Another sign said time to grow.
- 11:42Lisa Hopkins: I snapped a shot of something that the artist, rick Dillingham, said about his work.
- 11:48Lisa Hopkins: He said I calculate my process but not my work.
- 11:52Lisa Hopkins: The juxtaposition of basic stripes, zigzags, triangles and circles on the surface looks tricky, but it is not consciously set out to be a new image.
- 12:04Lisa Hopkins: When I put these things together, it's as much a surprise to me as to the viewer Interesting.
- 12:15Lisa Hopkins: I continued to meander through the exhibit and his work was beautiful.
- 12:22Lisa Hopkins: To meander through the exhibit and his work was beautiful, but somehow I knew that that wasn't what I was seeking.
- 12:33Lisa Hopkins: And then I found it.
- 12:36Lisa Hopkins: Underneath the glass casing was a typed letter from a fellow artist and mentor, I believe, and it was dated May 6th 1993.
- 12:48Lisa Hopkins: The author of the letter was a hundred years old when she wrote it.
- 12:55Lisa Hopkins: I'm going to read it to you now to see if it resonates with you as it did with me.
- 13:01Lisa Hopkins: You can replace potting, which is what this woman did, with whatever it is, that you strive to be in the world and see what it means to you.
- 13:14Lisa Hopkins: Again, keep in mind that when she wrote it she was 100 years old.
- 13:19Lisa Hopkins: She writes Dear Rick, when you speak about a new freedom in your work, I wonder what you mean, because I have found your pieces free and complete in themselves, with a fine sense of decoration.
- 13:37Lisa Hopkins: When we hear about what millions have to endure in other places in the world, I think those of us working in clay are very lucky.
- 13:47Lisa Hopkins: I know now that I've reached 100.
- 13:50Lisa Hopkins: I will have to leave this world before long.
- 13:53Lisa Hopkins: I am mad because there are so many glaze formulas I want to try.
- 13:58Lisa Hopkins: I know if I live another 50 years I would have the same comment, for I have an insatiable curiosity, except about men.
- 14:07Lisa Hopkins: One of my friends said it doesn't matter how long we live, it is how we live.
- 14:15Lisa Hopkins: That remark goes with me.
- 14:17Lisa Hopkins: Even though I'm mad that I cannot live forever.
- 14:21Lisa Hopkins: I don't fear death, for I have read so much and know of so many strange experiences.
- 14:27Lisa Hopkins: I think it's just stepping into another consciousness.
- 14:33Lisa Hopkins: And then she goes on to talk about her life and who's in her life and she signs off by saying and she signs off by saying but in spite of everything going on in the world, the real interest that I have is seeing that my two dogs and two cats are petted and happy with love.
- 14:54Lisa Hopkins: I was moved by this, profoundly moved by this, and again, if you listen again, you will hear yourself in her words.
- 15:07Lisa Hopkins: It was really quite remarkable to me.
- 15:10Lisa Hopkins: When I got home, I researched her and she lived another five years.
- 15:15Lisa Hopkins: She lived to 105 years old.
- 15:18Lisa Hopkins: Amazing right, amazing right.
- 15:23Lisa Hopkins: So the meeting with my mentor and the event and my peers was beyond my expectations as well, and I could go on to talk about that.
- 15:31Lisa Hopkins: But what I'd like to share with you is, after the event was over, I took a walk and I took a turn into this little alleyway where some artists were displaying their art, and I was feeling quite light and open and full and I was drawn towards this particular piece of art, which actually at first I thought was a painting, but it turns out it was a photograph.
- 16:10Lisa Hopkins: So I walked towards it and when I got there, I met the artist, who is a fine art photographer, who's based in Santa Fe, and I learned that she had come from Bali, indonesia, and that she couldn't speak, and she was the most beautiful being.
- 16:36Lisa Hopkins: We had no problem communicating In fact our communication without her being able to speak just made it that much more rich.
- 16:51Lisa Hopkins: Suffice to say, I bought the beautiful photograph of the blue door and I'm going to leave you with this thought.
- 17:01Lisa Hopkins: There's a poem that she wrote that's on the back and, again, I think it's no coincidence that I received this as I was getting ready to leave Santa Fe.
- 17:11Lisa Hopkins: It says the Blue Door In the heart of Santa Fe is a blue door with a metal bell on top.
- 17:23Lisa Hopkins: From far away, maybe you can hear this bell ringing.
- 17:30Lisa Hopkins: The bell asks us is this the way the knots of the heart are untied?
- 17:36Lisa Hopkins: Here in the summer, there are many roses.
- 17:41Lisa Hopkins: In the winter, by the blue door, the snows will drift.
- 17:48Lisa Hopkins: The artist's name is Sinta, sinta Tornick.
- 17:55Lisa Hopkins: I'm going to leave you with that.
- 17:59Lisa Hopkins: My friends, I'm Lisa Hopkins.
- 18:01Lisa Hopkins: Stay safe and healthy.
- 18:04Lisa Hopkins: Thanks so much for listening and remember to live in the moment.