Adam Blatner

Words and Images from the Mind of Adam Blatner

September, 2013

Mandala As Primal Diagram

Circular, vaguely or finely symmetrical drawings that usually show a center and a periphery—such are called “mandalas,” a word used in India. They recognize that certain kinds of art can stimulate meditation. I began drawing mandalas when I was about 30 years old. I was influenced in 1972 by a book titled “Mandalas” by Jose […]

Posted in Art (Mandalas, Doodles, Scripts), Autobiographical, Spirituality and Philosophy | No Comments »

An Invitation to Imagination

We are working on a revision of our book, The Art of Play. Its thesis is that imagination is related to creativity, and this is related to envisioning, and there may be further potentials of all this not yet envisioned. One aspect of this is realizing that we can say “yes-and” rather than “no but” […]

Posted in Play and Spontaneity, World of Almost-Real, Zordak's Journal | No Comments »

Commandments & Guidelines

The following cartoon has interesting wording: This is a deep misunderstanding of the nature of law. For the word “government” substitute “necessary,” because it is childish to think that the ten commandments are not ambiguous. For “guidelines” substitute the word “interpretations.” Think of what the Talmud was about, and modern-day Bible classes in many mainstream […]

Posted in Essays and Papers, Spirituality and Philosophy, Wisdom-ing | No Comments »

Social Sensitivity (or its lack)

Many qualities are enjoyed or missed by various people according to the varying distribution of talents. Howard Gardner, a psychologist, in 1983  wrote about eight that he identified in his book, Frames of Mind. One of these, interpersonal intelligence, is the focus here. My career in part is a healing of the wound, a compensation […]

Posted in Autobiographical, Mind-Spectrums, Psychological Literacy, Social-Depth Psychology (Sociometry) | No Comments »

Lifelong Re-Creation

It’s time here in the early 21st century to recognize that many procedures that have arisen from the context of “therapy” have far wider application! (It’s no more daring to note this than to note that there are now many thousands more applications for computers and associated technologies than there were back in the 1950s.) […]

Posted in Play and Spontaneity, Psychodrama, Psychological Literacy, Psychotherapy and Psychiatry | No Comments »

Life Enhancement via “Self Rev”

I have a friend in Oakland, California, named Sheila Rubin, who leads workshops on how to do “Self-Revelatory Theatre.” (This approach to my knowledge was first written about in the mid-1990s by another friend, Renee Emunah, and mentioned in her book, Acting for Real.) This is good stuff, but the appeal so far has been […]

Posted in Play and Spontaneity, Psychodrama, Psychology | No Comments »

Metaphysical Explanations

(With a drawing at the end as an example.) I’ve begun a new art form that mixes drawing and prose. Through this synthesis I attempt to explicate my version of how the cosmos is in an ongoing creative process. It’s poetic, not to be taken literally. I seriously doubt that language as it operates today […]

Posted in Art (Mandalas, Doodles, Scripts), Spirituality and Philosophy, Wisdom-ing, World of Almost-Real | No Comments »

Problems With Psychotherapy

Considering the challenges of counseling, let’s also consider the idea that there may be not just differences in the severity of illness, but rather different types of illnesses, as different as conditions caused by vitamin deficiencies and conditions caused by infectious agents (as I discuss on a webpage about the history of medicine.) So let’s […]

Posted in Psychotherapy and Psychiatry | No Comments »

Contemplating Compassion

This morning I awoke with a couple of dream fragments that felt significant enough to get me to reflect on them.    1. I had to go uptown a mile or so and somehow annoyed  my wife so that she was cross with me. I couldn’t figure out what I had done wrong.   2. […]

Posted in Autobiographical | No Comments »

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