I was at a woman’s writer’s workshop in Taos, New Mexico last year, and found myself at dinner sitting across from a riot of a feisty old woman who was talking about these children’s books she’d written. Her main character is a rascal and an adventurer, a boy named Weldon. This child came by his name when his father entered the birthing room after the child had been born and boomed to the new, exhausted mother “Well done!”

I say to her “Your books sound wonderful”. She leans over, looks me in the eye and says ” I have nothing to do with it. They just come through me. I open myself to them and there they are. But you know , I don’t tell very many people that.” I say, “Well, that’s probably how it is for most people,” and she says “Yes, but at least I admit it “, and really, honestly cackles . I realize that I am in the presence of a true creative witch.

I often say to my intuitive painting students that the painting is none of your business . When you open yourself to your creativity you are learning to trust that the divine source of inspiration knows what it is doing and doesn’t need much help from you. It’s learning how to step aside so that the muse can have her way with you without too much interference. You don’t have a choice about how your creativity manifests , or what your style is or even if your ego is going to like it very much. And when you are really allowing the creative flow to happen, you don’t even get to have a say about what shows up. You are merely a vehicle for creative energy to make it’s way into the world.

In these moments you are offering the Goddess of Creativity an open invitation to use you and come through you unhampered and unrestrained. You are saying to the holy inspirer, “Yes, I am ready. I am your channel. I am only here to take orders. Do with me what you will.”

However, once you declare your intention to surrender to this larger energy it is seen by the personality as a declaration of war. The puny personality does not want to give up it’s rather formidable hold on your creative energies and keeps poking it’s nose in every step of the way. This part of you is actually quite shameless. I mean, really, here you are inviting the Queen of the Creative Source in all her awesome beauty and limitless power to deign to channel herself through your human form, and the personality has the balls to have an opinion about the queen’s directives? The queen says, “Paint some blue over here”, and the personality says “Well, I think yellow would actually look much better.” I mean, the sheer cheekiness of it is enough to make a person blush!

Later that day at the writer’s workshop, gazing out over the red rock beauty of the Taos desert landscape,and asking the muse to bless me with some of her magic, I had a startling experience. As I was sitting there with my laptop, not really thinking, but feeling into myself about what I was going to write, I got in touch with this incredible sense of a glowing, radiant, energy body, something quite vast and rich, deep and old. It didn’t feel like my every day sense of myself. More like what I would call the ground of my being. But even those words can’t grasp it because it felt so much bigger than me, and in me and not in me at the same time. It was actually a little spooky and I started to wonder if the workshop facilitators had slipped a little chemical enhancement into my sparkling water to give my creativity a bit of a boost. But no, it was just the magic of the land combined with being part of a community of creative women and the willingness to give myself over to the creative force. And I realized in that moment of clarity and insight that pretty much most of it is none of our business.

As I make a continued commitment to an authentic, creative life it feels clearer and clearer to me that my primary function is to be in service to this greater presence. My assignment is to translate for it and to be the conduit, to have as my mantra “thy will not mine be done”.

We all have this vastness inside of us. We all have a purpose and a job to do. A job that was given to us by God or Great Spirit, The Divine All or The Universal Source. But we can only know what this purpose is by going inside and really listening. And of course one of the best ways of hearing our sacred directive is by tapping directly into our creativity. And finally, once those instructions start coming through we need to stop wasting our time quibbling and arguing with the Queen of the Numinous Mysteries or we will never get anything done!

Copyright © Chris Zydel 2008