On Creation

In the stillest moments of meditation, when my brain finally releases into the generous hush that is neither sleep nor prayer, I find I am starting to Blog. This is a concern.

Maybe it's a Quaker thing, but I think there's a difference between my inner circuitry of sensual perception that helps me feel the elements of a poem, for instance, and the larger Creative impulse. The second would be something beyond my own monkey brain who might actually one day have something important to say me if I'd just sit still enough for it, so this is no small matter.

Of course, whether she/he intends me to write about it is something else. And as a dilettante blogging on spiritual things, it's just so easy to say "Oh ho! Now that's nice! I better find a pen!" and to begin taking notes in the quiet, rather than allowing the deep listening that is so nurturing, even if nothing is Heard. And I try to remember a Chinese proverb shared by a friend at work: "Time spent sharpening the knife is never wasted."

I've consulted some experts on this.

Julia Cameron, in her introduction to her classic guide on creativity, The Artist's Way; A Spiritual Path To Higher Creativity, introduces the concept of God as "good orderly direction or flow". For her there's only one creative element.

What we are talking about is a creative energy. God is useful shorthand for many of us, but so is Goddess, Mind, Universe, Source, and Higher Power. . . . The point is not what you name it. The point is that you try using it. For many of us, thinking of it as a form of spiritual electricity has been a very useful jumping-off place.

She quotes William Blake:

"I myself do nothing. The Holy Spirit accomplishes all through me."

It seems to me William Blake reached a rare place in his cosmos where he could do three things at the same time: sense his own creativity, hear The Creative, and compose, which is why he's William Blake.

So maybe I am nearing a point where I want to leg up into one of these rare seats, but am certainly nowhere near encompassing all three at once. I think I'd like to be and that's where I get into trouble.

Right now the plan is to just sit in whatever seat I can get into that will stay still for me and see what happens. A little less caffeine would probably help.