The heart of creativity is an experience of mystical union; the heart of mystical union is an experience of creativity.
—Julia Cameron
Julia’s statement above certainly rings true for me. I remember sitting on the banks of the Ganges River in India, while visiting the town of Rishikesh high in the Himalayas. Each day, I would spend time sitting on my meditation cushion, seeking to quiet my mind and merge into that sublime space of spiritual opening. And day after day, my mind would not stop talking to me—no matter how many hours of meditation I did (and at one point during this India stint, I was doing about ten hours a day!).
But then I would go to the sunset fire ceremony, called Aarti, and sing to the divine, to God and Goddess in its many forms. And after a relatively brief period, my heart would open and I would melt into a God-intoxicated state, drunk on bhakti or devotion. And it was then that I realized that my own creative expression was a portal for me to access and express my full, radiant feminine nature. And so, I began to more deeply attune to the creative process and utilize it to water the plant of my soul.
Of course, those of us who are drawn to the arts each have our own preferences for artistic expression. For my husband, Stephen, it’s the written word that calls forth his mystical magic. And my friend Kalila finds she can belly dance her way to nirvana. There’s a good reason why flocks of people choose to go “sweat their prayers” at Five-Rhythm dance jam or Ecstatic Dance on Sunday morning, instead of punching in at the local church. And the reason is that we can access our divinity through our creativity, and as we tap into its force, it enlivens us and gives a nonlinear expression for the fullness of our being.
And yet there are times when most of us feel creative blocks in the flow. It’s time to turn on the creative juices, but the well has run dry. What to do? Where to get some juicy new ideas for our current creative projects?
For me personally, I generally like to start my creative projects with some sort of a theme. Once I have my theme in place, then it’s a lot easier to build from there. Here are eight tools that I use to rev up my creative engine and find an inspiring theme.
1) Begin by setting aside a chunk of time to go inward by stilling your mind through meditation or whatever process works for you. Connect with that part of yourself that is wise and universal, and inquire about what topic is calling for deeper attention at this time. If you get a clear answer, follow it! If not, proceed to the next steps.
2) Keep a file of the quotes, poems, images, and songs that touch or inspire you in some way. When I am looking for a starting point for a creative project (for example, a blog article like this one), I turn to the file and use something I find there as a jumping-off point.
3) Take note of the speeches or conversations of late that have impacted you in some way. Utilize the pieces that touched you as a starting point for a creative project.
4) Pull a card from a deck with lots of images, and see what sort of information the image might have about your creative project. You might use a tarot deck, the 13 Moon Oracle (my personal favorite), a goddess deck, or even Deborah Koff-Chapin’s Soul Cards, which have images that are not tethered to any specific meanings.
5) Choose a book that is filled with wisdom. Then sit with this book, and set an intention for receiving a good idea for your creative project. Then close your eyes and open the book. With your eyes still closed, let your finger point to a passage in the book. See what good ideas might be contained in that passage (or the passages before of after).
