HORIZON (Buddhism Blog)

But creative urges are part of being human. My creativity yearned for development and expression, even though I believed I was a tone-deaf non-artist. When I took an ear training class in college, I ended up in tears it seemed almost every day. I’d correctly sing “do mi sol mi do” with teacher Fred at the piano, then inside negative thoughts would say, “You can’t do that. You’re tone deaf.” The tension between my creative urge and my internalized self-doubt was excruciating.

           When I was a senior in college, I received my Gohonzon and studied and practiced with my whole heart. By chanting I overcame every obstacle to creating a multi-media interactive art installation in a gallery in San Francisco, as my final project for my BA degree in visual art.

            Yet, self-doubt continued to battle with my creative urges. I had internalized the belief that an art degree was worth nothing. That the phrase “starving artist” was inevitable. The only jobs I applied for were non-art jobs: package handler at UPS, florist delivery driver, even as a Mighty Maid. No one would hire me. I was living on cash advances from my credit card. I sought guidance from a senior in faith. She told me that to change my job karma I needed to treat my job search as a full-time job; wake up early, do gongyo and an hour daimoku, then spend eight hours a day applying for jobs, and go to SGI meetings every evening. She said that whatever job I got, to continue my hour of daimoku (chanting gratitude that I had a job) before going to work, and to cheerfully give 100% all day at my job.

             I got a job as a Super Shuttle driver, then switched to be a dispatcher because it was the hardest job there. With my kotekitai YWD marching band training, I figured that if I was there to change my karma, then I’d choose the most disagreeable job to change more karma faster. I was the first female dispatcher for Super Shuttle in San Francisco. My shift was 4 am to 2 pm. I continued to get up and chant an hour of appreciation-filled daimoku before work and gave my all for that 10-hour shift, then went to SGI (then NSA) meetings every evening. Soon, I was offered a promotion to middle management. I told my boss that I really wanted to do art. Was there any middle management position where I could maybe design brochures or something? Anything creative?

                “No,” he said.

                “I’ll stay as a dispatcher,” I said.

One day, out of the blue, a former classmate from a Native American Music class at San Francisco State called me about something, and it turned out she was leading the day camp at the San Francisco Boy’s and Girl’s Club in the Haight Ashbury, where I’d worked as a driver for a couple of years as work-study. My classmate said that the Boy’s Club didn’t have an Art Director. So, I trotted on over to talk to one of my old bosses and told him that I now had my Art degree and I wanted that Art Director job. He warned me that he wouldn’t be my boss for that job; my boss would be this other guy who I’d had conflicts with. I told my old boss, “After being a dispatcher at Super Shuttle, that guy is nothing. I can handle it.” So, I became the Art Director for a summer, which eventually led to other art jobs.

            Now you may have noticed that the headline of this article says something about “Shoten Zenjin” (protective universal forces). Here’s that part. Creativity. I’ll always remember a pivotal moment when I suddenly felt blessed by conventional society for me to be an independent artist. It was as if the entire Financial District of San Francisco had transformed into Shoten Zenjin and suddenly cheered me on to follow my own creative path, a path that was outside of the roles I was taught as a child were appropriate for women: secretary, teacher, nurse. I would never be an executive assistant and that was great!

            There I was, living in San Francisco in the mid-1980s. I’d received my Gohonzon and started chanting about a year before. I was chanting to be happy and be an independent artist living amongst nature with my soulmate, and making art. By then I’d earned my BA in Art with sculpture emphasis magna cum laude from San Francisco State University. I’d been working driving taxis and Super Shuttles and motorized cable car tours of the city, which left me no time or energy to pursue making art.

            Someone (a Shoten Zenjin) suggested I take a career guidance course at acertain organization downtown, south of Market. It was a several week course. All women. I was the only one who arrived on a 1982 Honda CM450E motorcycle, in jeans and leather work boots, entering the classroom carrying my helmet like a basket with the deerskin gauntlet leather gloves folded lovingly inside. The teacher and all the other women students wore dresses and pantyhose and heels. Office attire. We were all at a crossroads in our working lives and looking for what our next direction would be. We took tons of different sorts of standardized tests about our personalities, our abilities, our aptitudes.

            We discussed the results of the tests under the guidance of the teacher. At one of the discussions, after I’d shared about my test results, all the women had listened attentively and one spoke with certainty and told me, “You are meant to be an independent artist.” All the women nodded and murmured in enthusiastic agreement.

             At that moment I felt like I was supported to be who I am. Always I felt like the black sheep. And there were all the white sheep so happy that I was a black sheep and to totally celebrate and enjoy my black-sheep artisthood. I was not meant to be a corporate employee or work in an office. There wasn’t anything wrong with me. All these office-attired women were cheering me on to walk my own path, a path very different from any of their paths. Their approval and encouragement felt very important to me.

             Although somehow, I still seem to carry that insecurity about being a black sheep. The insecure feeling that I’ll be rejected by people or groups because my path has not been their path. Just the other day, I received an email from professor B at a fancy university, who had referred me to almost a dozen other professors to ask them to write a promotional blurb for my latest book, Adela Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose, translated from the Spanish.

              I had just mailed Professor B a copy of the book as a thank you gift. She emailed me to say she’d received the book, then peppered me with questions: Where did I live? Where did I work? What was my research field? And more. Inside my insecurities boiled up. I suddenly felt like I was under a hot white lamp in a locked room being grilled with questions by suspicious detectives giving me the third degree.

              I worried that Professor B would reject me because I wasn’t working as a professor in a university, or anywhere. I am an independent researcher and artist. I chanted daimoku then answered her questions honestly, although with a somewhat quaking heart.

             A couple of days later I received her email reply. Professor B was celebrating my unconventional life! She loved my website LynetteYetter.com. She offered to buy my kosen rufu novel Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace for her fancy University’s library. She wants to support my movie Panpipes for Peace when it’s done. Wow! It’s a continuation of that long ago moment in the San Francisco classroom when women in conventional society happily cheered me on to be who I am … an independent artist.

              I see that my recent Master’s degree in Liberal Studies from Reed College has become my doorway into being an independent researcher whose work is embraced by folks with PhDs in the field. And it’s more than okay with them (at least with Professor B) that I’m also an artist.

             Creativity. Now I’m diving into studying improv theatre, and just did my first theatre audition since high school over 40 years ago. My book Adela

             Zamudio: Selected Poetry & Prose is advancing in the judging for the PEN Poetry in Translation Award, and other prizes.

I cherish being able to nurture my creativity together with others. And when I feel insecure, and when I am celebrating, I chant Nam myoho renge kyo.

Happy New Year Everyone!!!!

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo