The Creative Drive - Galway Kinnell

One can have a lot of time and yet feel one has very little.
A person who wants an inner life needs what you might call
"open" time - time that hasn't already been filled before one
enters it with minor concerns, little duties.  The more
conscientious a person is, the more easily small things force
themselves into the consciousness.  Precisely because they are
so small one knows one can easily take care of them.  I keep
finding in my pockets old lists of errands that in hindsight are
incredibly trivial.  It's the fact that the items are crossed off
that 's so pathetic - the fact that I actually worried about these
tasks and actually did them.  Tillie Olson has written an essay
on the penalties of postponing serious work for the sake of
things of this kind.  It's a fine essay.  She advocates going
straight for the real work and to hell with everything else.
And she's right.  The creative drive withers away otherwise.

I produce most and write best when I have no schedule at all,
when I'm able to wander where whim carries me - both physically,
through a city or a countryside, and mentally, in reading, talking,
scribbling, thinking, whatever.  Poems don't come to me often
when solicited.

Galway Kinnell

- from an interview published in the book Walking Down the
Stairs.

Downtime is the basis of creative time.  It is important that that
time not be filled with trivial things --  errands, doing the
dishes -- but rather time to day dream, [to spend time in
"The Silence"], to meander through the backwoods, to wander
around town, notebook in hand, just in case something bubbles up.

Rod MacIver
Heron Dance

~

Art - Mystic Meandering

Vortex Art 2024

Water Whirlpool
on black paper

 

Your Outlook Matters - John O'Donohue

Sometimes when we look out, the world seems dark.
War, violence, hunger and misery seem to abound.
This makes us anxious...  What can I do in my private little
corner of life that could have an effect on world events?
Believing ourselves to be helpless, we hand over our
power to forces and systems outside us that then act in
our names; they go on to put their beliefs into action; and
ironically their actions are often sinister and destructive.

We live in times when the call to real presence is urgent.
We need to rediscover the careless courage, yet devastating
simplicity of the little boy who, in the middle of the
numbed multitude, in naive Socratic fashion, blurts out:
"But the emperor has no clothes."
When spoken, the truth can bring down citadels of falsity.

The spirit of a time is incredibly subtle [or not], yet a hugely
powerful force.  And it is comprised of the mentality and spirit
of all individuals.  The way you look at things is not actually
a private matter.  Your outlook actually and concretely affects
what goes on.  When you take back your power and choose
to see the possibilities for healing and transformation, your
creativity awakens and flows to become an active force of
renewal and encouragement in the world.  In this way, even
in your own hidden life, you can become a powerful agent
of transformation in a broken, darkened world.

John O'Donohue
From: To Bless the Space Between Us
(written in 2008!)

~

Intuitive Art - Mystic Meandering

If you look closely you can see little "beads"
scattered in the painting and the larger one in the purple heart.
They are Snowflake Obsidian from a bracelet I once wore,
and just happened to find them in a little plastic cup.  I had placed
them in a particular order on the painting that was lying on
my work table, and then accidentally hit the canvas, scattering
the little beads over the black and white swirls of the painting. 
I left them where they were, and glued them to the painting. :)

The properties of Snowflake Obsidian are:
Brings about balance, removes negativity from
 a space or person, and  promotes a sense of calm and
 inner centering - where our real power lies.

Amazing!

Creative Entitlement - Elizabeth Gilbert

Creativity is the relationship between a human being and
the mysteries of inspiration...

You have treasures hidden within you... extraordinary treasures.
Bringing those treasures to light takes work and faith and focus
and courage...  and the clock is ticking, and the world is
spinning and we simply do not have time anymore to think small.

We are all capable of brushing up against a sense of mystery and
inspiration.  We may be able to draw nearer to that source than
we think, being gently propelled by some force.  Something
carries us along, something not "me."

"Creative Living" is living a life that is driven more strongly
by curiosity than by fear.

You will never be able to create if you don't believe that you
are entitled to at least try.  "Creative Entitlement" doesn't mean
behaving like a princess, or acting as though the world owes
you anything.  Creative entitlement simply means believing
 that you are *allowed* to be here, and that merely by being
 here you are allowed to have a voice, and a vision of your own. 

The poet David Whyte calls the sense of creative entitlement
"the arrogance of belonging" and claims it is an absolutely vital
privilege to cultivate if you wish to interact more vividly with life.
Without it, you will never push yourself out of the suffocating
insulation of personal safety and into the frontiers of the beautiful
and the unexpected.

"The arrogance of belonging" is not about egotism or self-absorption.
In a strange way it's the opposite.  It is a divine force that will
actually take you out of yourself and allow you to engage
 more fully with life.  It's not abut saying "I am the greatest", but
 merely saying "I am here" - to simply allow yourself to exist
 and express yourself. [to allow your Core Beingness
to express through you...]

Your soul will mobilize accordingly.  It will mobilize ecstatically,
because this is what your soul was born for.  Your soul [your
Core Beingness] has been waiting for you to wake up to your
 own existence [your innate Aliveness] for years.

Do whatever brings you to life.  Follow your own fascinations...
Trust them.  Create whatever causes a revolution in your Heart.

Inspiration is trying to send you messages in every form it can.
Through dreams, through portents, through clues, through
coincidences, through deja vu, through kismet, through inspiring
waves of attraction and reaction, through the chills that run up
your arms, through the hair that stand on the back of your neck,
through the pleasure of something new and surprising.  Through
stubborn ideas that keep you awake all night long - whatever works.

The work wants to be made, [whatever 'the work' is for you] and it
wants to be made through you.  [You Core Being wants to express
ItSelf through you in creative ways.]

Elizabeth Gilbert

From: Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear

[brackets mine]

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
photo of leaves on grass in the Fall, color digitally inverted.

Magic! :)

Eccentricity - Nick Bantock

Eccentricity is underrated.  I'm not talking about the, Look
at me, I'w wearing strange clothes and waving my arms
around trying to get attention, sort of behavior, but a kind
of eccentricity that frees-up people to be individuals,
rather than nodding clones.

Being a genuine eccentric means.....your mind passes
into new territory.  And once you've entered that unique
space, staying with it, and not worrying how others may
interpret your preoccupation...

It takes courage to open your eyes wide and express
what you see and feel in a way that gives you and others
the permission to articulate, create and challenge the tired
norms that neuter and suffocate...

After all, what do you have to lose?  And think what there
is to gain, if not a world of possibility.

Nick Bantock
Facebook

via - Donna Iona Drozda

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

Balance - Ursula Le Guin

Do you see how an act is not like a rock that one picks up
and throws, and it hits or misses, and that's the end of it.

When that rock is lifted, the earth is lighter; the hand that bears
it heavier.  When it is thrown, the circuits of the stars respond,
and where it strikes or falls, the universe is changed.
On every act the balance of the whole depends.
The winds and seas, the powers of water and earth and light,
all that these do, and all that the beasts and green things do,
is well done, and rightly done.  All these act within the
Equilibrium. From the hurricane and the great whale's
sounding, to the fall of a dry leaf and the gnat's flight,
all they do is done within the balance of the whole.

But we... we must learn to do what the leaf and the whale and
the wind do of their own nature.  We must learn to keep the
balance.  Having intelligence, we must not act in ignorance.
Having choice, we must not act without responsibility.

Ursula K. Le Guin
The Farthest Shore

via - Beyond the Fields We Know

~

Maybe we just need to keep learning how to live with each other
in a balanced way...

MM

~

The stars are like letters which inscribe themselves at every
moment in the sky.  All things depend on each other.
Everything breathes together.

Plotinus
CE 204/5-270

~

Photo - Funky art with "Scratch and Sketch Artist's Tile."
Represents balance, but also - how everything we do or
say reverberates out, affecting all beings...

Waking up to your Aliveness - Elizabeth Gilbert

Creativity is the relationship between a human being and the
mysteries of inspiration...

We are all capable of brushing up against a sense of mystery and
inspiration.  We may be able to draw nearer to that source than we
think, being gently propelled by some force, something not "me."

"Creative living" is living a life that is driven more strongly by
curiosity than be fear. [But] you won't be able to create anything
interesting out of your life if you don't believe in "creative
entitlement."  This doesn't mean behaving like a princess, or acting
as though the world owes you anything.  "Creative entitlement"
simply means believing that you are allowed to be here, and that
merely by being here, you are allowed to have a voice, and a vision
of your own.

The poet David Whyte calls this sense of creative entitlement "the
arrogance of belonging", and claims that it is absolutely vital
to cultivate if you wish to interact more vividly with life.
Without this "arrogance of belonging", you will never be able to take
any creative risks, without it, you will never push yourself out of the
suffocating insulation of personal safety and into the frontiers of the
beautiful and the unexpected.

The "arrogance of belonging" is not about egotism or self-absorption.
In a strange way it is a divine force that will actually take you out of
yourself and allow you to engage more fully with life.  Because often
what keeps you from "creative living" is your self-absorption, i.e.
your self-doubt, your self-disgust, your self-judgment, your crushing
sense of self-protection.  The "arrogance of belonging" pulls you out
of the the darkest depths of self-hatred, not by saying "I am the
greatest!" but merely saying "I am here" -
the simple entitlement to exist and
express yourself.

Your soul will mobilize accordingly.  It will mobilize ecstatically,
because this is what your Soul [Being] was born for.  Your Soul
has been waiting for you to wake up to your own existence
[your Aliveness] for years. 
[Being wants to express ItSelf through you in creative ways.]

Elizabeth Gilbert
Author of Eat Pray Love

above excerpt from: Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear 

[brackets mine]

~

Photo - leaves on grass,
color digitally inverted