Facilitating Creative Breakthroughs
Joseph Campbell said, “The way of the artist and the way of the mystic are very much alike, except the mystic does not have a craft.”
Creativity is not just a personal tool for our projects. It’s an alignment with a higher intelligence.
The creative process allows us to have a conversation with Something greater than ourselves. It puts us in touch with transcendent wisdom. Artists engage in a process that lets them touch something that’s alive. 🌱
I once heard the celebrated filmmaker David Lynch interviewed on NPR’s Fresh Air. Host Terry Gross asked Lynch something about what he does when he makes a movie.
Lynch responded that when he makes a movie, he “doesn’t really know” what he’s doing.
This statement has always stayed with me. When the amazing David Lynch makes a movie, he doesn’t really know what he’s doing.
And yet his movies are fantastic. 😱
Perhaps… creative brilliance requires that we “not know.”
Perhaps… not having any idea what we’re doing can work out better than we can imagine.
Perhaps… when we don’t know what we’re doing, we’re actually at our best.
Perhaps…when we don’t know what we’re doing, we’re hooked up to a greater wisdom.
Not knowing is the essence of creativity. 🌟
I taught creative process courses for several years in a graduate program at the Sophia Center at Holy Names University. The thing I enjoyed most about teaching this course was that I got to share the things that inspired me.
Week to week all I did was bring in what inspired me.
So on that notes, Corita Kent was a big part of my courses. Kent was a Catholic nun, a pioneering artist, and a profound teacher of art and creativity.
Her work spoke to my students and never failed to liven up my classes.
Here is a little of her brilliance (excerpts from her book, Learning by Heart):
“Work is often done by playing around. For example, when you set out to write something that must be finished and finely crafted, you can begin by playing around. Write anything that comes into your head or write about what you see around you or what happened yesterday. …playing around until something comes…”
“Art does not come from thinking, but from responding.”
“When we pursue a thing for love, we are free to fumble and make mistakes. The course of our work may not run smoothly, but we are open to possibilities, embracing everything we have contact with. Our vision is not narrowed by convention.”
It’s so freeing to pursue what our heart loves rather than what we’re told is valuable by the external world.
In alphabetical order, 17 potent, inspiring, and relatively unknown books on the power of art, imagination, learning, and metaphor. (These are books not commonly known, so that’s why some popular books on creativity and imagination aren’t listed.) Enjoy.
If I’ve missed something, please let me know. I’d love to hear it!
Click here to read my reviews of these books:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/648771?ref=nav_mybooks
Psychologist David Premack writes, “The original and basic unit of mental activity, which remains the psyche’s preferred way of operating, is the image.”
Humans have been accessing inner images since pre-historic times when tribes painted visions onto cave walls.
In the case of every scientific discovery which has been researched carefully, it has been found that it was imagery, either in dreams or in the waking state, which produced the breakthrough.
Maybe we should pay more attention to the power of images?