The Creative Process

MADDENING! ... That's how I would lovingly describe the creative process. Sometimes I think creativity is given to us for the simple reason that it gives God a good laugh seeing us go borderline bonkers. But, truth be told, it may not be the "creative" process itself that drives me to drinking....store brand soda. I would say it's more the "nurturing" process. (that thought just came to me....which is what happens when you just start writing without planning things out and have no real direction in mind) The easiest thing in the world for me to do is think up ideas for new stories, new books...heck, even movies I think should be made. And, without trying to sound arrogant (which is usually only said before someone wears themselves out from self back-patting), the ideas that come to me are generally very good. This is naturally the most exciting part of the whole process - the initial spark and the heat that emanates from it. I bet it's kind of like when a person is stranded on an island and tries to make fire with rocks and sticks for the first time. They sit there for hours and hours trying to make the first spark appear, and when thankfully, gloriously, it appears, the elation that person experiences is unparalleled. Even if it quickly dies off and firmly places the person back at square one of the fire-making process, the energy they received from seeing that tiny spark will ...well, fuel their fire to not give up and to continue until their fire is raging. Or, at least that's the way I think it should work. But I don't think it always does. Perhaps the reason the "creating" aspect of the creative process is so easy is because we have nothing to do with it. Perhaps the initial spark is a gift...God's way of stirring up the dust in our minds to do something marvelously creative in the same way He stirred up a little dust when He decided He wanted us around in the first place. Once He stirs up the dust, He sits back to see if we will make something of it...to see if we nurture it properly. Unfortunately we often don't take the nurturing stage seriously...and by "we" I mean "me"(although "unfortunately me don't take the nurturing stage seriously" is a horribly worded piece of rubbish). If our stranded-on-an-island friend decided to just go for the spark, and quit once he got it, never nurturing it until it become a roaring blaze, his fire would likely die and eventually so would he, unless an Aquafina plane crash-landed onto his island and provided him with a lifetime supply of factory treated tap water. Thomas Edison is credited with the saying "Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" and I am often ("often" here means "this is the first time I have ever said this") credited with the saying that "Edison was 100% right." The 1% of inspiration, which I think is from God, is the easy part. The hard part is actually doing something with it, sticking it out until the last word is written, the last note composed, or the last line uttered. The hard part is keeping the ideas alive. This is our fault of course, since we take a great idea and start on it with all the passion in the world, but abandon it because Monday night is softball night, Tuesday night is "Biggest Loser" night, Wednesday night is church night, Thursday night is "Survivor"night, Friday night is...Friday night, and Saturday night is "I am way too tired from my exhausting week to do anything" night. Our ideas are pushed way back into the depths of the "idea refrigerator" in our minds, and by the time we dig them out again, they have molded over and started to smell an awful lot like some of the other ideas that have long since rotted away. Then we try to revive them, get right back to where we were before we stored them away, and then....you guessed it, store them away again. It's a vicious cycle really...kind of like the dog that returns to its vomit (but really not like that at all). I suppose this may not make sense to some people, and to those blessed souls I apologize that you even spent time reading this and give you permission to cease at once. But I also suppose that there are probably a few people nodding along with me, because they are all passengers in the same doomed ship I'm sailing in. The lifeboat has been there waiting for us the whole time, within reach to every person. But, it takes too much time and energy to drop it into the water, because the name of the lifeboat is "Time and Energy." I am one that firmly believes that some of the best ideas the world could have ever known were lost because the people who contemplated them gave up, and got too preoccupied or distracted to return to them. But that's completely understandable, since all day "Seinfeld" marathons don't happen every day. I know you've got some marvelous idea stirring in your head....a song that hasn't been written, a poem that hasn't been put to page. Don't let it die. Work at it. 99% perspiration means it won't be the easiest thing you've ever done. And don't for a second give me the line of "I just don't think it's the right time for me to work on it." If that were the case, it wouldn't be digging into your brain right this second. Time and energy people. Get to work.