IN BRIEF

A mandala is a purposeful visual composition incorporating different symbolic and geometric patterns that can lead to shifts in consciousness, perspectives, and energy flow. I like to describe them as the transcription of inter-dimensional experiences into (more easily) tangible forms. Mandalas can serve as portals through which we can interact with different realms of reality.

IN LONG

Let us begin by distinguishing [words] from (what they refer to), without getting too deep into the complexities of the distinction. “Mandala” is a Sanskrit term usually translated as “circle”. Nonetheless, depending on the source, the context, and the translator, a multitude of translations may arise. Here’s some: circumference, disc, ovule, halo around the Moon or the Sun, orbit of a celestial body, anything that is round, sacred circle (as in the Divyāvadhāna), circle enchanted with a spell (as in the Śatapatha Brāhmana), anything that is triangular or square (as in Hemādri’s Chaturvarga Chintāmani), a ball for playing (as in the Maha Bhárata), a mirror, or a particular position useful for shooting arrows, among others.

The word mandala more popularly refers to a form of spiritual and artistic expression well-developed within Buddhism and Hinduism, consisting of diagrams or schematic / symbolic representations of the macro- and micro-cosmos. Mandalas within these traditions usually use the circle (and derived measures) as encompassing principles or starting points, some more explicitly than others.

A bit about the ontology and “origin” of mandalas

The underlying form of artistic and spiritual expression that I am referring to when using the word “mandala” has been around in many cultures since the beginning of history. Both the academy and different oral traditions acknowledge this to be the case. Concrete, non-controversial examples can be found in:

● 6,000 year old Sumerian seals ● 5,000 year old Mediterranean plates ● the Disc of Bashika, dating to around 700 BCE and traced to Mesopotamia ● the Gotland spiral, dating before the Christian era ● Aztec and Mayan calendars dating BCE as well ● Bambara patterns in West Africa ● Ashanti patterns in what is now known as Ghana ● Greek Lemniskate marble engravings dating from the 5th to 8th century CE ● the “Musical Discs” that the Anasazi use on their age-old pottery ● Celtic Solar Discs and Spirals from the 6th and 9th century (respectively) ● Ravenna’s cross from times of the Byzantine empire ● different shapes on the floors of Nishapur, Iran, dating from the 10th century ● the list goes on…

Cultural diffusion? Independent invention? I guess it depends on how we define each. Is diffusion something that happens exclusively by physical means and contact between different peoples, or are we willing to accept that we also interact in non-physical, supra-physical and/or metaphysical ways? Examples from a broad range of fields may seem to support the latter. Contemporary scientists arrive at important breakthroughs via 'independent' work at roughly the same time (take the events around the cloning of Dolly the sheep, for example, or how different feminist scholars arrived at gender structure theory). Different studies have shown that crossword puzzles that have already been solved by a big number of people are easier to solve for people that have not seen them (when compared to giving them unsolved puzzles). Ken Keyes speaks of the controversial “100th monkey effect” by reviewing research and suggesting that when enough individuals in a population (of Japanese monkeys, in the original case) adopt a new idea or behavior, some sort of breakthrough takes place, allowing this new awareness to be communicated “directly” and without the connection of external experience… Scientists have refuted the latter by reinterpretation of the original research and the debate has dwindled out... On other notes, Carl Jung states that mandalas are representations of the unconscious self.

An Alternative (Integrative?) Proposition

Perhaps we can think of mandala-type art in other terms. First off, most human cultures on the planet have flourished by studying and understanding the cycles in nature: from knowing when to expect the night and the day; the rains, the warmth, and the abundance of food; to looking at the different configurations that our solar system can take, within itself and in relation to our galaxy. The ancients were quick to figure out that Venus paints a 5 pointed star in the sky every time the planet completes a full cycle, as viewed from here (and of course, the heavenly sky providing the encompassing “circle”). Astrology in its different forms incorporates a map of the heavens (usually a circle divided into 12 parts) and you can think of your astral chart as your very own birth mandala.

If you stand in any given point and look around you, you are instantly situated in the center of your circle of vision (the circle is more evident if you’re in a plain, plateau or mountain peak). And the mathematical definition of circle is pretty simple: it’s the sum of all the points that are at the same distance from a given center point. Nonetheless, this center point is not always explicitly visible (in the same way that a mathematical point does not have latitude). But we somehow know it’s there. The vital impulse of a circle is only possible through the stability of its center point: try drawing a circle with your legs as the compass and you will find out.

If you look into a particular thing or being, the thresholds of your vision can also become evident – usually taking a circular shape as well. By exercising your vision, you can start to see beyond this circle and into others. A good way to experiment with this is by staring at the sky in a starry, silent night, and opening up to be guided by that which goes beyond your current view and understanding of the world. Your vision will take you further and further: you may begin to see stars that you originally didn't see; you may get a sense of movement or perhaps brightness; shapes might start to pop out... all this becomes more evident as you practice and learn to look at the energy fields around and within light, water, beings, and sacred places. So perhaps mandalas are some of the oldest exercises at graphically representing what is revealed by different types of inner vision. In this way, they may be similar to painting a portrait of a person, flower or place with our 'ordinary' vision. Hence, to some extent, mandalas may reflect concrete realities that go beyond and within the one(s) we routinely and consensually experience and manifest in our day to day. Discussing the origin of the art forms I’m referring to as mandalas may be akin to discussing the origin of flowers by looking at art history, or analyzing which group of people painted them first. I guess we can assume that flowers have been there for a while, even before we started painting them outwardly…

But there is more. As we break through to higher thresholds of vision, what we see or access may become increasingly 'complex', and thus harder to 'ground' and convey via two- or three-dimensional representations. In this way, mandalas can be a tool for exercising, studying, and quickening inner vision; for understanding ourselves and the worlds around and within. Drawing or following a mandala is also a way to bring forth what the inner vision is able (or has already been able) to see. This can also incite ourselves to see further. And in this process, paradoxically, we can become more aware of our own center and standpoint.

Bridging the Gaps

Different visionaries in different realms of activities (including the arts, sciences, philosophy, spirituality...) have pushed what we understand as “ordinary” once and again, also broadening our conception of “reality” (think, for example, of how our scientific encounters with germs and microbiology have modified the way we think of the “real” causes of disease). Nonetheless, mandalas provide a unique approach in the sense that they bridge the gap between realms of activity that we usually tend to think of as separate: left and right brain hemispheres, abstract and concrete reasoning, arts and science, aesthetic and practical, feeling, intuition and reason, and so forth. Mandalas can easily bring together and synergize fine artistic expression, mathematical proportions, mystic experience, rich symbologies, sacred geometry, and utmost precision in the form of organic hints at perfection. This is, in part, why making or looking at a mandala can simultaneously stimulate and appeal to different dimensions of our being.

And here, also in part, the power and recursiveness of the particular artform generally referred to as mandala. For me, this artform speaks of a mystic exercise in accessing / studying / representing, in terms of our consensual reality, that which is beyond it. Hence,  at the core of this notion is a process of interaction; even in making or contemplating. The invitation is open!


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