When we jump off the merry go round, leading us to nowhere, we let go of the never ending need for external validation. We become empowered to live through our hearts, to connect with a higher power, to evolve as human beings and to align with our own unique destinies. Our focus shifts, our energy becomes redirected and we begin to move inward for inspiration. Our creative processes change, we move out of our heads and into our hearts where we connect with our special gifts waiting to be expressed with the world.
Today many artists take on the burden of being solely responsible for the quality of their artistic creations, leading to fear of failure, fear of success, narcissism, energetic blockages and more. Our society endorses “fame” as the ultimate form of success, a false recognition placed on the person, not on the source of inspiration. This forms intense pressure to produce something better each time, instead of just allowing authentic expression to flow. Often times you see artists influenced by so many outside sources that they lose their edge, they become mass marketed and their unique spark no longer shines. I find it so powerful to live in acceptance of everyone and their creative processes, to alleviate the pressure of “success”. I find importance in acknowledging the artist as well as their message, and to empower others to feel comfortable expressing what lies deeply within their hearts. There is no right way, there is only your way, and you will find this through self acceptance, inner validation, and self love.
Before the renaissance period it was common practice to work in collaboration with the divine, this was accepted and verbalized. The Greeks referred to this process as ‘Daemons’. Socrates was very outspoken about his divine attendant who visited him from afar and regularly spoke to him, guided him and helped the words flow. The Romans referred to the artist who was connected to divine inspiration to be with “genius”, not a genius, but to be with “genius”. They recognized the divine spirit of creativity within an individual, not as being the individual. This is very different from how masters of the creative arts are perceived by the masses today.
Psychologist Carl Jung has said that the “ability to reach a rich vein (the unconscious/sublime) in such materials and to translate it effectively into philosophical literature, music or scientific study is the hallmark of what is commonly called genius.” Jung also learned through observation that in the 20th century we have been blinded by our scientific and technological achievements and have forgotten the age-old idea that God speaks through dreams and visions. We have become detached from the idea that human beings work creatively with a divine presence leading to glorification of a creative genius instead of focusing on the source of “Genius”. Albert Einstein, quite possibly the greatest scientist of the 20th century agreed with Jung, believing that “ideas come from God” he acknowledged that the role of divine revelation in his own great contribution to science, the theory of “relativity”.
When we dive deeply inside, we connect with our own unique divine spark and what begins to happen creatively is miraculous, we become more and more comfortable looking inward for answers, allowing divine inspiration to flow through us. Many musicians, when asked how they wrote theirs songs, respond with descriptions of how the words came to them in a dream or how they just flowed through them. Very often they laugh and say that the words came from a place bigger than themselves, they came from a place deep inside themselves, a place that is connected to a higher power. Pablo Picasso, the inventor of the artist movement called cubism, famously said “you should be able to say that such and such a painting is as it is, with it’s capacity for strength because it is touched by God.”
It is easy to get caught of in every day life and to lose our connection with a higher power, the connection with ourselves, and to get lost in a world outside of ourselves. The magic happens when we reconnect with to our fire within, our inner gifts, and the divine inspiration that resides with in each of our hearts. When we live authentically, when we lead with our hearts, and when we inspire others to do the same, we find sustainable success. It’s an inside job.
