Well, Well, Well...
The expression of creativity is the expression of selfhood, the release and freedom of personality from the confines of brittle ego. In all of its many outlets and forms, creativity is therapeutic, with benefits extending beyond mind and body, into spirit. These deeper spiritual benefits of, say, singing from the soul, dancing with the flow, or painting what's “down low,” are also what make those works of art so personalized, meaningful, and, in many cultures, sacred. In the slow process of learning to access that deeply powerful “soul” side of expression, I had to first acknowledge that I had an expressive side at all; I had to say, unabashedly, that “Yes, I am an artist!”
When diving into many of the modalities in class which I had, previously, not experimented with, I often had to mentally shift gears in order to channel that “soul side” of expression into that new terrain which I was not so familiar with. I thought of that source, that “soul side” of the creativity, as coming up through a deep well of cool fresh inspiration. Extending through my throat and ribcage, and further yet into and beneath the floor, far below into the deep cavernous aquifer, the oceanic expanse of the collective unconscious. The mouth of the well is my own mouth, and when I tap into it, the subconscious, in all its currents and aquatic life, speak through me - spilling freely onto the page, onto the canvas, into the air. It's that loosening, that half-sleep sort of relaxed state, where I learned to submit to the muse, to whom I served as merely a calm but gracious host.
The well we each carry within, and dive through each night into dream, carries with it powerful implications. The most significant of these implications is that the inspirational state is derived by some “other,” the classical concept of the muse as the divine source of creativity. All of the greatest voices of mankind, back through the millenia of civilization, have confessed that they cannot take credit for those masterpieces; that they were not that work's creator, but were acting merely as an instrument, wielded by some greater being. The implication, then, is that the peak inspirational state is more a sort of subtle mediumship, an act of channeling a consciousness other than ourselves and granting that consciousness physical expression through us. This explains the descriptions made by those countless artists and musicians of the “thoughtless flow” experienced when they fully submit to the inspiration of the creative state, allowing it free expression. To envelope this into the metaphor of the well, it could be said that that subterranean oceanic expanse of the collective unconscious has living within it entities of every shape, color, size, and intention, like any other ocean we can know. These conscious muses swim and splash about and, if they so choose, can easily make their way up through our well to sing through our mouths, or perform through our fingers. We each have the capacity, to one degree or another, to act as a gateway for the muse, if that spiritual entity so desires to influence culture and chooses us as her outlet.
Yea, I know you all just LOVE reading my midterm papers...
When diving into many of the modalities in class which I had, previously, not experimented with, I often had to mentally shift gears in order to channel that “soul side” of expression into that new terrain which I was not so familiar with. I thought of that source, that “soul side” of the creativity, as coming up through a deep well of cool fresh inspiration. Extending through my throat and ribcage, and further yet into and beneath the floor, far below into the deep cavernous aquifer, the oceanic expanse of the collective unconscious. The mouth of the well is my own mouth, and when I tap into it, the subconscious, in all its currents and aquatic life, speak through me - spilling freely onto the page, onto the canvas, into the air. It's that loosening, that half-sleep sort of relaxed state, where I learned to submit to the muse, to whom I served as merely a calm but gracious host.
The well we each carry within, and dive through each night into dream, carries with it powerful implications. The most significant of these implications is that the inspirational state is derived by some “other,” the classical concept of the muse as the divine source of creativity. All of the greatest voices of mankind, back through the millenia of civilization, have confessed that they cannot take credit for those masterpieces; that they were not that work's creator, but were acting merely as an instrument, wielded by some greater being. The implication, then, is that the peak inspirational state is more a sort of subtle mediumship, an act of channeling a consciousness other than ourselves and granting that consciousness physical expression through us. This explains the descriptions made by those countless artists and musicians of the “thoughtless flow” experienced when they fully submit to the inspiration of the creative state, allowing it free expression. To envelope this into the metaphor of the well, it could be said that that subterranean oceanic expanse of the collective unconscious has living within it entities of every shape, color, size, and intention, like any other ocean we can know. These conscious muses swim and splash about and, if they so choose, can easily make their way up through our well to sing through our mouths, or perform through our fingers. We each have the capacity, to one degree or another, to act as a gateway for the muse, if that spiritual entity so desires to influence culture and chooses us as her outlet.
Yea, I know you all just LOVE reading my midterm papers...