the art of living "pay the devil, jab jab"

I picture life as a large canvas. Man has been painting on it only within recent times. We add our strokes on the piece of canvas we have been given. Each stroke that we make in life, leaves its mark on this canvas, and affects the whole painting. The brushes and tools are given to us. The colours and how we mix them is up to us.

There are the carefree stokes, and the laboured strokes. There are the practical strokes and those that are mysterious. There are the bold strokes, the timid strokes. Some strokes are made with great effort and thought, and others are whimsical. Some are bright and full of joy, and some are dark and painted in desperation.The errors and the cover ups are there to see, no matter how much we erase and try to paint over them.

Our actions and our efforts seldom 'add up' as we thought they should. We may have had one picture in mind, and another one emerges. Each stroke we make is relative, in that it affects the whole painting. The green might be too green. Or it may be sitting next to a colour that causes disharmony. A bit of paint here and a bit of paint there.

It is only when we stand back from it, that a picture emerges. We can't change the colours we used along the way. And we can't change the strokes of times gone by. All we can do now, with the strokes left to us, is to try to bring some balance and harmony to what is there. We are the painters.

"Pay the devil, Jab Jab"