Creativity as a Life Path

From layout I sent: pages 4-5 which includes art;work The Elder Grove and the following text: We are all not only creative but creators. We are constantly making art in how we dress, how we talk, how we garden, cook, dance, sing, how we decorate our homes, and how we think. Art is life. We can create out of confusion (chaos) or out of conscious intention. But we are always creating. We create with every thought, action, and choice. The products of creativity are as uniquely varied as the individuals who produce them. Creative expression is what colors our world and makes us each who we are. If I want to know you I’ve but to look at what you create. I have chosen a variety of my own creative works to share with you in these pages with the hope you might be encouraged to more fully explore and discover your own unique creative self-expression. By learning to create with conscious intention, you can create a life you love. It is my hope that by opening up to you, being vulnerable to you, my reader, you might become more vulnerable in sharing with others the beautiful, creative being that is you. Creating with intention requires vulnerability. Jan pages: 19-20, the following text: Introduction More than twenty-five years ago, when Through the Inner Eye: Awakening to the Creative Spirit was published, I primarily focused on creative expression through the arts, specifically painting and poetry. I had discovered that through my own creative process as a painter and poet I was connected with something more, something beyond my own knowing. It literally seemed that my paintings, for example, knew more than I knew and were teaching me about my surroundings, my relationships, and most of all, my inner self. I realized, through my creative expression, I was being led into a deeper meaning in my life. At a point when I was going through a very difficult realization about my failing marriage, I came into the studio upset and angry from a confrontation with my now ex-husband. Feeling a need to let out my frustration on paper through painting, I took a large sheet of watercolor paper, wet it with a large brush, and began to drop and throw colors onto the wet paper. I chose reds and purples, working quickly and intensely. The release I felt was fascinating. I found it even more amazing that the anger began to melt away; a feeling of peace came over me. The painting was softening as color melded with the wet paper, and instead of angry blobs of color, there appeared abstracted flowers on a background of soft blues and purples. The message was clear: “Things are happening exactly as they need to.” I stared at the finished painting in a surreal calm. I knew it was true. Things were exactly as they needed to be. That very week, Exactly as It Needs to Be sold to a client who loved the colors and related to the story of its creation. This seemed to be validation of the truth of its message. Each of us needs to believe there is meaning in being here and in going through the process of living that is often difficult and painful. Most of us spend years seeking that meaning outside ourselves through the perfect partner, the perfect job, children, and success. Some achieve great fame; but within, in spite of achievements, there remains a vague longing for something more, as in that old Tony Bennet song, “Is That All There Is.” There is a great deal of joy in finding what constitutes a reason for one’s existence. I believe what compels us is what the author, C.S. Lewis, called the “inconsolable longing.” Eventually, failing to assuage that longing with our curiosity or our seeking, we are compelled to go within and create from what we find there. It is most surely a longing to know the true Self, the self that sees through the Inner Eye and communes with the Divine. This process clearly opened me to a greater awareness of Self and a deeper sense of my purpose in life. In the twenty-five years since sharing an awakening to this inner guide, not only have those words, exactly as it needs to be, proven true, but I’ve had numerous experiences that equally validate the premise of that first book. Today many have written about exploring the powerful potential of connecting with one’s own creative energy. It seems humans have evolved enough that the time to understand and apply these concepts has come. In her blog for Psychology Today, June 6, 2010, Allison Bonds Shapiro, M.B.A. writes, “Dr. Ruth Richards, my friend, and teacher, is fond of reminding me that creativity is our birthright. It is not a special talent limited to famous artists and writers and musicians. We are all creative. We are built to be. Being human requires us to adapt to the changing circumstances of our lives.” This is what Dr. Richards, who is certainly an expert on creativity, calls “everyday creativity.”