A New Inspiration

Almost a year ago, I received an almost sudden inspiration during my meditation to illustrate images from the festival of light. I didn't have a clear heart connection with the idea then, and it wasn't clear how to proceed.

Fast forward to spring of this year, I went through a challenging physical issue that proved to be difficult on many levels and was a test of faith in a way that I had not expected or imagined (I am all healed now by God's grace). While I was in the hospital in a foreign country all by myself, I was forced to go within to find strength, and in a miraculous way, the words from the Festival of Light came to my rescue. The challenge was necessary for me to create a connection with the Festival of Light.

I did meditate on the project after that experience. It still wasn't clarifying, though. I wanted an external sign that would validate the idea and inspire me to work on it.

I had the great good fortune of spending time with Narayani and Shurjo during their visit to the US this summer. Without sharing the details of my inspiration, I sought counsel from Narayani on the general idea of the text and a potential illustration. She was thrilled and immediately nudged me to work on such a project. With subsequent discussions I had with her, finally, I had the signs and the inspiration was clear enough for me to proceed.

Long hours of discussion with Saiganesh followed. His understanding and connection with the text helped me tremendously. We both worked on dividing the text into sections for illustration, discussing the core ideas and images that Swami presents in each section and how best to visually represent them. The discussion are still ongoing and have taught me so much already.

My goal and hope are to one day design and print a piece—probably a booklet—that includes the words of poetry, with these illustrations flowing seamlessly and creating a powerful visual story for anyone who reads it to discover their connection with this sacred text.

This note and background is to share with all of you, my friends, this inspiration and the pieces I have completed already, so you can follow along and join me on this journey. If you want to continue receiving these notes or see the paintings as I finish them, you can sign up for notifications (no marketing intent, except just to share my inspiration with everyone)

Love,

Nivedita

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