…to create, to take what we find in the shadows of our lives and craft what never before has been seen.
(Jan Richardson)
It’s certainly not the first time these words have appeared since beginning this Lenten series nearly a month ago. I don’t mean to wear out their welcome, but they continue to speak to me in new ways, with different perspectives, and with unique emphases.
I posted a few weeks back on the desert’s creation being our very selves. This time, I’m thinking more of creativity’s outworking(s); the way they are made manifest in the very things we dream, craft, and construct – whether art, words, surroundings, relationships – all wild beauty.
Before doing so, however, let me set the context and the pairing – as I understand it – of creating and the desert. It seems to me that many of us create because we must. It does not mean such is easy or even natural. It takes work. It feels like work much of the time. It is work. It bleeds us dry. And we can’t not. That said, what we create is, at least in part, an expression of our truest, purest, heat-purged selves; formed in the arid, desolate, and dark parts of our soul, now made manifest in wild beauty.
This upcoming week I will think about this far more – inspired by the brilliant and beautiful words of others.
The first steps of a creative act are like groping in the dark: random and chaotic, feverish and fearful, a lot of busy-ness with no apparent or definable end in sight.
(Twyla Tharp, The Creative Habit)
These words take me to others that I have known since before forever:
1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and [God] separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness [God] called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.
Twyla Tharp and the Divine (no matter how we understand such) speak of the same reality: darkness hovering, a space of chaos, an unknown. We can thrash and flail in those spaces – those deserts – and yet, they are the very environs that invite our most powerful and transformative creations, sometimes in spite of ourselves.
For me, somehow, that changes how I understand the desert itself: darkness and chaos as givens. If wild beauty can result, I can stay. I will stay.
The very shadows are what enable me to craft what never before has been seen? Light emerging from darkness? I will continue to create – even if I do not know what, how, when. I can’t not.
It is good.
For your reflection:
- Think about any forms of creation that feel resonant for you. Have they emerged from ease or from struggle? From plenty or from lack?
- What is your gut-level response to the Genesis 1:1-5 verses? Where do those words take you? Can you think about/apply them in the context of creativity? Any different perspective or response?
- Understanding creativity to begin in random and chaotic realms…what might you create in those spaces, in your desert(s)? What would “let there be light” look like for you?
- “It is good.” Can you imagine the Divine saying/meaning such about any and all that you might create? About you?
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Thought-provoking as ever!
Interesting, because one of my answers turned out to be one of your later questions too.
As far as creativity, I find that sometimes it flows and sometimes it’s a struggle. Usually, when it’s a struggle, I’m trying to make something work and make something happen that isn’t yet fully formed. The best work, for me, seem to be those things that have been germinating and then kind of ‘come forth’ with some sense of ease.
As for Genesis:
My initial thoughts have to do with the words, “And God said…..”
He spoke it first. Which brings me to two things.
1) Words have awesome power. What we say, even our thoughts to ourselves, matters.
2) We are created in God’s likeness. God is very very creative. So we are too. Our gifts might be different, our talents might me different. It may not be ways in which we typically define creativity, but we’re all creative in some way.
3) Combine the two. God spoke it, then it was created. It’s the same with us. We have the idea, the desire, the spark, we speak it (or think it) and then we create it. (Whatever ‘it’ might be for each of us.)
And then the “it was good” phrase struck me and I smiled knowing that the verse is out there about God creating man and woman and saying, “It is good.” And yes. Based on what I believe, I can imagine the Divine saying ‘it is good’ about me and what I might create — and you too.
Love!
deb
Yes, Deb: words do matter. We “speak things into being” all the time, don’t we? Creative power inherent within them. And yes, “it is good!” The trick is believing it, isn’t it? Thanks for being here…for reading…for commenting.
I wrote a post on creation stories a number of years ago that might stand alone as a response to some of your questions: http://chriscorrigan.com/parkinglot/?p=330
.-= Chris Corrigan´s last blog ..The gift of wisdom offered freely =-.
SO glad you commented here, Chris, and directed me to this long-past post. SO perfect! All of it. But this? Beautiful:
“We operate out of deeply held stories about creation and renewal. Where we come into conflict with one another it feels dissonant but sometimes we can’t put our finger on why. I’m suggesting that some of the dissonance we “process” people feel from “results” people is at a fundamental level. I mean, which story do you really resonate with?”
EXACTLY what I’m saying over at Desiree’s site today! Different language. Same message.
Thank you! SO grateful to hear your voice.