Getting to the Core of Creativity (Part 3)
So what of the thought that we have to “open up” our brains to get the creative juices flowing? What of the many sordid tricks out there of producers, managers, agents, friends, etc. working with artists to un-stuck them from a rut? The assumption is that creativity follows the other parts of our life. If we can get the nob to click then something will open and out will come creativity. In all these scenarios, creativity follows, it does not lead. But in Genesis it led. We have the Spirit hovering over the darkness. That hovering term is a bird-term. You can see the wings spread now going over the deep in anticipation, excitement. The creative Spirit was on the offensive, the tip of the arrow heading into the dark.
Why then? We don’t know that part. We don’t know what conditions had to be in place for the act to begin. But we do know the creative act began in the dark. It did not wait for creativity to start flowing. It started flying. Creativity followed hovering. What is hovering? Great question. It may be as simple as walking around a vacant or under-utilized room in the house and just start imagining what could be. It might mean being attentive to our current restlessness. It requires we look at what is not yet. It requires focus on the blank canvases around us. It is not an assessment of what already is. It is not sentimental in the least. It is a determined and almost meditative pondering of what could be.
Some say the great sculptors would stare long enough at a rough piece of stone until they could eventually “see” the piece they would soon carve to. in other words, there job was cutting away the stuff that was not part of the finished product.
We don’t all get to cut away. Sometimes we have to create the materials, or buy the paint, or fix the guitar, etc. There is a step before creating. Do that. Be loosely ready. Then hover. Then wait. Don’t force too quickly in the process a product.
That is the beautiful mystery of the process. We are not ultimately in charge. Those who treat (or are in such a position they must treat) the creative process professionally, this can be difficult. They inevitably will run into their own walls. Pushing ahead of inspiration will lead to some major distractions, as least for content creators. We must wait, and follow, and write, and wait, and follow, and write. The connections aren’t necessarily made, we just follow what is coming out openly.
That great outpouring is not nicely laid out for consumption. It is messy. It is laid out poorly and will need arranging. That is the more disciplined, mechanical part of the process. But arranging the parts is much easier than creating them. That is the part that we must painstakingly bear as artists: creating something out of nothing. Arranging the pieces is part of it, but not the primary. Ours is to create, out of some internal drive and inspiration. Where is will go we may never know.
(start writing!...movie scripts, fiction, poetry, lyrics, whatever...)