What is the Purpose of Art?

Hey all! Sorry for the long time between this post and my last post- school caught up with me. I've decided to just go in order of the chapters in Soul Pancake, partly because I'm too ordered and structured to do it any other way, and partly because the next chapter is Art and Creativity, which I'm pretty excited for. So, here we go!

From "Art & Creativity" section of "Soul Pancake":

What is the purpose of art? What is art? What piece of art most speaks to you? How does knowing the intention behind a work of art affect your experience of it?

First off, let me say that I am by no means an expert in art. In fact, I actually know very little (especially when it comes to the visual arts).

Soul Scribble

From "The Brain & The Soul" section of "Soul Pancake":

Visualize your soul for a moment. Now scribble, sketch, or rip up those old magazines you have lying around, and create your take on what your soul "looks" like.

Ok, so I'm not very artistic. And I ESPECIALLY can't draw, so I decided to make a collage. Basically, I sort of had an idea of different images that might be part of my soul (I used the list of things that re-charge my soul that I made in an earlier post to help with this). Then I went through magazines and through google images to get some things that I thought would sort of describe parts of my soul, and still look sort of good together.  This is the end result. This is by no means a complete picture of my soul, of course. I like to think of it as a little snippet of my soul. Or like, maybe a snapshot! Anyway, here's the finished collage:

Soul Songs #3

This post's soul song is called "Rock and Roll" by Eric Hutchinson.

Unlike the previous two soul songs, this song doesn't immediately conjure up soothing images of country lanes and streams and such. I like this song because it's just so laid back and chill. It's such a fun, upbeat song. It can brighten my mood pretty well.

I love listening to this song

Re-define Spirituality

From "The Brain & The Soul" section of "Soul Pancake"

So this is a new one, ya'll. That is, this is one of the activities in the book that I haven't posted about yet. So here's a quick explanation of it: Soul Pancake gives you a word. The one I'm posting about today is "spirituality". The book gives you standard definitions and synonyms of that word.

Tell me Now!

From "The Brain&The Soul" section of "Soul Pancake":

Tell me Now! List five questions that you hate not having the answers to.

1. When will I find true love?
2. Am I choosing the right career?
3. Will I be financially stable in the future?

Soul Songs #2

Sorry that it has been so long since my last update! The next few activities in the book are all ones that are going to require a good deal of thought, and I've been so busy that I haven't been able to get around to them
:(  But I will soon! But for now, here's my next soul song: "Fables" by the Dodos

This song just makes me picture strolling down a deserted country lane,

What drains your soul? What recharges it?

From "The Brain & The Soul" section of "SoulPancake":

What drains your soul? What recharges it? What is the soul? Can you kill your soul? Does the soul have a gender?

I think that the best way to tackle this would be to start by answer the question "What is the soul?" I think we need to have a definition of what a soul actually is, before we can answer any of the other questions.

So what is the soul? I believe it's the spiritual part of us, and maybe the moral compass as well. It's the part of you that makes you feel fully alive and connected to the world (for example, when you step outside on a sunny spring day and smell the fresh air and feel the sun on your face, and just feel so peaceful and so alive and so connected to nature...that's the soul's doing). I think that the soul is