Beginner’s Mind
In Buddhism, what is known as beginner's mind is a way to look at the world as if for the first time: with interest, enthusiasm, and engagement. This may be the optimal state of mind for a healthy brain. Louis Cozolino
Gregg’s Reflection
In my study of structure with Robert Fritz, learning to see reality clearly is the starting point of any creative act. Any distortion of our view of reality will make it nearly impossible to move to your desired vision. If you want to reach a destination, but you are not clear where you are on the map, what are the chances you can find the way? Done well, a clear vision, and an unflinching view of reality will create structural tension that will propel you towards your desired future. Here’s what that looks like:
To illustrate this, Fritz described a tool artists use called the spot screen. An art professor took his students over to Long Island and had them look across the water towards New York City. “What color are the buildings?” He asked. “The glass ones are blue, the brick ones are red, the concrete ones are white,” the students responded. Then he gave each one of the a spot screen, a piece of card stock with a pin hole in the middle. “Look through the hole and tell you what you see.”
“Everything is a shade of blue,” they responded. He explained that when they first looked, they saw what they had been trained to see. When they looked through the pinhole, they realized that what they were really seeing was the water vapor between them and the buildings, hence the blue color. The spot screen is a tool to help show the artists the need for a beginner’s mind, one uncluttered by preconceptions of what we might see, but instead sees reality as it is.
The Beginner’s Mind, or Child’s Mind, is a well-known Buddhist concept. Yet, Jesus taught his disciples this when he said, “Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”
So, journey with us as we learn to look at the world once again with a child’s mind.
Blessings, Gregg
Journaling Prompts
How does what you expect to see influence what you actually see? How has misdiagnosing the current reality you are facing thwarted you from finding what you are seeking? How does your picture of God impact your life? If you see an angry, judgmental God, how do you keep from being angry and judgmental yourself? If you believe you are unworthy, how hard is it to believe you are the beloved of God?
Scripture
He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way.
Psalm 25:9
For the Lord takes delight in his people; he crowns the humble with victory.
Psalm 149:4
Jesus, “have you never read, ‘From the lips of children and infants you, Lord, have called forth your praise’?
Matthew 21:16
After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.
Luke 2:46-47 Jesus at 12 amazes the scribes at the Temple
For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.
Luke 14:11
People were also bringing babies to Jesus for him to place his hands on them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”
Luke 18:15-17
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.
Ephesians 4:2
Ancient Writing
Contemplation requires us to hide all people in all things past, present, and future, and all accomplishments, under the cloud of forgetting. To the cloud of unknowing above you and between you and your God, add the cloud of forgetting between you and creation. Hide all creative things, material and spiritual, good and bad, under the cloud of forgetting.
Carmen Butcher, The Cloud of Unknowing, p. 21
This path of self-knowledge must never be abandoned, nor is there on this journey a soul so much a giant that it has no need to return often to the stage of an infant.
St. Teresa of Ávila
Modern Writing
Jesus never uttered a loftier or a grander truth than when he said that wisdom cometh out of the mouths of babes.
To see what no human has seen before, to know what no human has known before, to create as no human has created before, it may be necessary to see as if through eyes that have never seen, know through a mind that has never thought, create with hands that have never been trained. This is beginner's mind, one of the most difficult states of being to dwell in for an artist, precisely because it involves letting go of what our experiences have taught us.
Beginner's mind is starting from a pure childlike place of not knowing. Living in the moment with as few fixed beliefs as possible. Seeing things for what they are as presented. Tuning in to what enlivens us in the moment instead of what we think will work. And making our decisions accordingly.
Any preconceived ideas and accepted conventions limit what's possible.
We tend to believe that the more we know, the more clearly we can see the possibilities available. This is not the case. The impossible only becomes accessible when experience has not taught us limits.
There's a great power in not knowing. Innocence brings forth innovation. A lack of knowledge can create more openings to break new ground. Experience provides wisdom to draw from, but it tempers the power of naivete. The past can be a teacher, offering tried and true methods, familiarity with the standards of the craft, awareness of potential risks, and in some cases virtuosity. It lures us into a pattern that absolves us of the opporunity to engage innocently with the task at hand. When you see what’s present around you as if for the first time, you start to realize how amazing it all is.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Knowing, p. 120-123
How do we forget everything we think we know about ourselves—our names, duties, worries—long enough to wait for God in the stillness? This humbled state is something that Richard Rohr often calls “the beginner’s mind.”
He writes, “The author of The Cloud of Unknowing is always saying you’ve got to balance your knowing with a willingness not to know…first we have to enter the Cloud of Forgetting—to forget all our certitudes, all our labels, all our explanations, just forget them! They are all a waste of time. They are nothing but our ego projecting itself and announcing itself. It has nothing to do with objective reality. If the world doesn’t learn this kind of humility, what we’re calling ‘beginner’s mind’, I think we’re in trouble.”
Richard Rohr, Sitting with the Unknown, Turning back to the Wisdom of the Cloud of Unknowing, Center for Action and Contemplation, We Conspire series, 2/21/24
In Buddhism, what is known as beginner's mind is a way to look at the world as if for the first time: with interest, enthusiasm, and engagement. This may be the optimal state of mind for a healthy brain.
And the end of all our exploring
will be to arrive where we started
and know the place for the first time.
T.S. Eliot
So the most difficult thing is always to keep your beginner's mind. There is no need to have a deep understanding of Zen. Even though you read much Zen literature, you must read each sentence with a fresh mind. This is also the real secret of the arts: always be a beginner. Be very very careful about this point. If you start to practice zazen, you will begin to appreciate your beginner's mind. It is the secret of Zen practice.
We recognize that we are always a beginner in life. When we think we have everything figured out, cynicism and cleverness clouds our vision.
Beginner’s mind is the practice of coming to an experience with an openness and willingness to be transformed. Art is one way to reconnect us with our childlike sense of wonder. When we engage art as prayer we can remember that play is also an act of prayer, praising God out of sheer delight. We can learn to take ourselves – our art and our spirituality – a little less seriously.
Christine Valter Paintner
Rainer Maria Rilke writes:
"If the Angel deigns to come it will because you have convinced her, not by tears but by your humble resolve to be always beginning; to be a beginner."
Bringing the mind and heart of a beginner to our lives helps us to discover the wisdom inherent in each moment. When we let go of our desire to be clever or successful or create beautiful things we may begin to open to the sacred truth of our experience as it is, not how we want it to be.
Christine Valter Paintner, Abbey of the Arts
What is a beginner’s mind? Having a beginner’s mind means you approach the world through a beginner’s eyes. It means you look at every situation you’re placed in as if it’s the first time you are seeing it.
The late Shunryu Suzuki wrote about this in his book Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind: “If your mind is empty … it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.”
Think of it this way, a beginner doesn’t have any expectations, preconceived notions, or past experiences to limit their view of a situation. Beginners also have curiosity towards something new and are open and eager to learn. This means that a beginner has access to a world of possibilities. When they try something new there are no existing expectations to limit their mindset about what could (and should) happen.
Having a beginner’s mind means developing this mindset even when you already know something or have lots of experience with a topic. On the other hand, an expert mind is an attitude taken when someone believes they know enough about something in order to achieve what they need to do.
Although an expert may know a lot, an expert mindset provides a narrow point of view that can block you from finding new (and better) solutions to a problem. A beginner, however, will not see a right or wrong way to approach a problem or situation.
5 Ways to develop a beginner’s mind
1. Ignore the stories past experiences tell you. You’ll start feeling much less upset at situations that you can’t control.
2. Take inspiration from children. For a child, almost everything is new, and they approach these situations with wonder and amazement. They don't live their lives based on a preconceived idea of what it should be.
3. Slow down. When you know how to do something, it’s easy to go to autopilot. Instead of automatically going through the motions, slow down and take your time, rediscovering every aspect of the task. Act with intention and live in the present moment throughout the entire experience.
4. Remove the word ‘should’ from your vocabulary. Saying something ‘should’ happen a certain way ties you to the outcome. Instead, let go of the outcome and of your beliefs about what should happen or how something should be done. Let the world surprise you with new potential outcomes, and keep an open mind.
5. Put your ego on the back burner. If you’re an expert at something, you probably want to be recognized for it. It's good for your ego. But as a result, you may want to be right at all costs.
A beginner is almost never right, and as a result, they enjoy new learning experiences. Let go of the need to be right, and approach every situation as an opportunity to learn something new and improve yourself.