Transcendental Doodling – Drawing on the Inexpressible

Words. Sometimes they’re not enough, sometimes they’re too much, and it’s often difficult to articulate what you wish to express: a feeling or sense of longing you can’t quite identify, an idea that’s only a notion, or simply a need to escape the chatter of the information age.

I’ve never had much luck with meditation. I don’t know why. I’m just fidgety. But I have discovered activities that have the power to put me in a trance: running, listening to music, sometimes writing, and as of late, drawing.

I started dabbling in drawing a few months ago and immediately found it a wonderful escape from the analytical. The deeper I go, the further I drift from the onslaught of messages I’m constantly receiving and sending myself. It’s like a mini-vacation from the left side of the brain, a journey into a timeless space where shapes and shadows trump facts and figures.

Transcendoodle Meditation

Perhaps my favorite kind of drawing is simple doodling. I put on some music, grab my sketchbook and pen, and follow the ink wherever it leads.
I immerse myself in a foreign language where the only parts of speech are the rise and fall of the music and the shapes and lines on my page. There’s no grammar to learn, no spelling errors to avoid. It’s just me and my soul, taking a playful break from the workaday world.

But it’s only recently that I’ve allowed myself to doodle without apology. I initially saw it as a waste of time, a fruitless escape from real drawing. Now I believe it’s essential. It’s essential because I enjoy it, because I find it soothing, restorative, peaceful. Every time I enter that quiet space, I come back refreshed and somehow changed.

Having freed myself to play without apology, I find myself getting excited about the possibilities and growing eager to discover where it all will lead. If I could learn to infuse everything I do with that same spirit, there’s no telling what I might accomplish. Who knows? Maybe that playful spirit is working its way through my brain at this very moment, searching for nooks and crannies to settle in. I hope so.

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