Any Creative Spirits In Your Home?

Lessons Learned

A Glimpse Into The Creative Spirit

Time. Patience. Non-judgment. Safety. These things all are mandatory for a creative spirit to feel free to create. A creative spirit comfortably and frequently dwells in a place of great vulnerability. This place is one where wide open emotions, wild imaginings, and novel, exciting connections intersect.  It is an exhausting and exhilarating place all at once. The birth of an idea occurs in a place where a brave creative spirit is willing to take a great risk and expose his or her heart. For example, a composing artist might be inspired by a landscape, an event, a relationship, a life story, or any other of an infinite number of inspirational sources, and then the seed of that inspiration takes root in imagination’s fertile soil. While germinating, the inspiration, for a composing artist, develops an identifying sound and a musical color which will ultimately be creatively translated into a melody. Sometimes this creative process takes a great deal of time, sometimes it unexpectedly bursts forth from seemingly nowhere, but in any case, it cannot be timed, measured, demanded of, or really even controlled. It just is as it is. Which comes first, the lyrics or the melody? There is no standard recipe. There is no prescribed order or flow chart design.  It just is. And when pen finally puts creativity to paper, we see the fruit emerge. The fruit of this particular creativity is a song.  A unique melody.  A unique combination of words.  A unique color of emotion extracted from the original inspiration.  This unique musical composition depicts the artist’s very own musical connection to the object of inspiration, and to be invited to hear this melody by the artist’s hand is to indeed be considered a trusted confidant.  Words need to be few in this moment of hearing a new song.   One who snaps to reckless judgment, one who values to the highest priority the narrow parameters of extreme efficiency, one who typically favors status quo in general, one who is easily distracted and unable to simply breathe in the awesomeness of newness, one to whom nothing is ever quite good enough, these would rarely be the ones invited into this moment of creativity unveiled.  These are actually the ones who bind the creative spirit within boxes of ordinary, predictable, beigeness.  Within these boxes creativity suffers and dies, for creativity must be free if it is to exist at all. Be gentle with the creative spirits in life, in your home, in your classroom, in your workplace. They see the world a bit differently. They see possibilities unnoticed by others, and possibilities stir hope. Sometimes the possibilities they see drive them, compel them to travel to distant places. The compulsion to see and to know and to pursue the possibility burns inside the creative spirit, unrelenting and intensifying until the bags are packed and the journey has begun. And the standers-by, the loving, safe, supportive arms that have held them all along need to loosen their hug and let them go. Let them go despite the fears, despite the tears, for a creative spirit is destined to fly, to seek, to soar. Although dream realization and dream shattering disappointment forever dwell concurrently as equal possibilities, the hope of the realization fills the heart and motivation of the ever-optimistic creative spirit. The try is worth the quest. The hope is worth the risk. The dream, the faith, the belief, the conviction is so unwaveringly fierce that doubt is buried and forgotten. A creative spirit is willing to leap into the unknown for the strong promise of what could be. They defy despair, and the gifts they bring to the issues of life which we all grapple with both individually and corporately may just hold the promise of a solution. Would that we each seek to be mentored through a season by one who is a creative spirit and experience first-hand the jubilation of possibility.