creativity.

“But unless we are creators we are not fully alive. What do I mean by creators? Not only artists, whose acts of creation are the obvious ones of working with paint of clay or words. Creativity is a way of living life, no matter our vocation or how we earn our living. Creativity is not limited to the arts, or having some kind of important career.” 

~Madeleine L’Engle, Walking on Water

The book Walking on Water by Madeleine L’Engle {love her!} taught me a lot about a part of myself. While reading the book, I discovered that I am connected to a history and legacy of people who see the world not in black and white but in greens and yellows, swirls and dots, rhythms and rhymes.

It helped me to understand so many of the frustrations in my life; why I can’t commit to the uninspiring, why I have no concern for social pressures of normalcy.

I’m an artist. I live, think, express, cope, function, survive creatively.

So a few days ago when I realized there was no creative energy running through me, I felt like I was dead. It took me 40 minutes to get out of bed and I sat around crying, unable to express myself in any way. I tried playing the piano, I tried writing and coloring, listening to music… nothing worked. It felt like something very crucial to survival was broken.

The next day I went to the zoo with Cassie and Katie. At one point we were sitting by the elephants, watching baby elephant Sam, and we talked about how all of these animals showed us God’s creativity.

I’m fairly mediocre at most arts. The one art I definitely excel at is the piano, maybe even just music in general. Painting is definitely not anywhere high on my list of artistic abilities. But it’s all vital to survival. and you do ugly things when your survival instincts kick in. This summer, I painted a picture. It’s the first five words of the Bible..

“In the beginning, God created…”

You know how people say you inherit things from your parents? I know there are a few things I inherited from God. A love for community is one. Creativity is another. The first thing he ever told us about himself is that he’s a creator. My disconnect from creativity goes beyond emotional to spiritual. and that’s exhausting.

Today I woke up at 7 am on my own, brewed a pot of Jim & Patty’s coffee {the first time since I left southern California} and as I paced around I felt my creativity sparking. It was almost a tangible feeling, like when you say “my stomach hurts.” My creativity was sparking. I hurried to the piano and played for hours. Literally hours.

Maybe it’s the coffee, maybe it’s the Holy Spirit, but suddenly I’m full of words and colors and sounds and I feel a huge burden lifted off of me. Music I’ve been listening to for a week is suddenly more beautiful and I can’t wait to bust out my crayons and write letters. It’s exciting.

The only unfortunate thing is that I’m determined to clean my room and I am suddenly so distracted by the thought of drawing: writing: singing: jumping on my bed: playing my poor old clarinet: coloring: cutting and gluing…

The fortunate thing is that for the first time in a really long time I logged into my WordPress account and decided to update because I wanted to, not out of a feeble attempt to regain something lost.