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| Historians and Anthropologists track the progress of a civilization by its art forms. The more organized and industrialized a society becomes the more leisure time it can afford. With leisure comes art. Hunter/gatherer societies have little time for creative pursuits as every individual in the clan is needed to produce the necessities of life. With modern life come the artist and the creative who are freed from the toil of needing to produce and given the time to just create. |
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Product Type: Kindle Store
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Amazon's Price: $ 4.99
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With creative care comes creative explosion. With creative neglect comes creative death. I can relate to the death part. The explosion has gone from the juices that used to flow and what is left is the charred husk of what once was. It can come again, that bursting of newness. Not without the leisure time or the focus to bring it about. Some of it is paltry in happenstance, a little getting up earlier here to write in a journal, a little artist date there to fill the senses with something new, and a smidgeon of care giving here to remind the self that the creative side is important too. It can be burdensome to quit the habits of old and step into something new. It can be harder still to release those bad habits that continually sap the energy and make writing or creating that much harder; the things we are loathe to let go of but know they are dangerous to a recovery. Those little things we tell ourselves in the hush of the night, “you are not good enough to make it” or “what you do is never good enough”. Friends who enable our cycle of procrastination or self pity or worse other blocked artists who draw energy off of those whom they like to keep just as empty. Family who look down upon the creative in their midst and preach fear and loathing to all efforts at such a pedestrian pursuit.
I am writing this on my third 4th of July as an editor of this newsletter. Freedom to express and create comes to mind as just one of the many things we owe our past generations of both statesmen and soldiers for granting to this land of ours. Creative freedom is something we take for granted. In societies where this is not the case creativity is the first thing to go that is unless it can be contained and constrained to the will of the state. Our republic has produced for the world an endless parade of artists who have impacted life and culture. But freedom is not enough nor is the ability to create enough. We can still be prisoners and serfs in our own little selves and miss out on the freedom to express that can be ours for the taking. Are we enjoying what we have or lamenting what we want but fail to possess?
Blocks descend up us in various forms and for me they seldom mean facing a blank page with nothing to write about. It is the failure to just express in new forms or in older forms that used to drive my energy. A sense of hopefulness and purpose free from doubt and fear once pervaded my creativity much as a child at play. I know I’ve written on this topic numerous times and preached a message of child like simplicity but perhaps I still need to preach the message to myself because I discover that I still do not get it. It sounds good and I agree with it but have not incorporated it into my normal modus operandi. I still strive to write what will gain acceptance in the market place. I become ruled by the promises and half truths of publishing for the utility of it all. Jealous moments are spent greedily coveting the apparent success of a peer while at the same time telling myself they are a slave of the pursuit of success. It is a life spent in futility within the chains of my own self made confinement.
These things need not be at all. Creativity does not serve economics or fame but the pursuit of the divine; art and spirituality have common threads and for much of our world’s existence art and faith held common cause for both expressed recognition of something out there over us. Michelangelo’s David springs to mind as the expression of the divine within Israel’s greatest king expressed in marble and revered for its naked beauty. Did the creator of that statue do it just for fame itself or did he do it because he found trapped in that marble slab an image of the poet/king? I need to remind myself that art and creativity even if it is just a simple story are done to seek something of the divine around us. It is vain glory to seek stardom but a humble artist can pass down through the centuries something of recognizable creative expression.
As I am reminding myself to take care of my creative side I remind all of us to play a little for a time if not to just seek the creative spirit that indwells all.
How would you characterize your own creative spirit?
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Cherry picked a few items on site about creativity and what it means to the various authors chosen.
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Q’s from last NL
Do you create prolifically or sparingly? Do you work and rework the same project over and over again or do you, like the painter Paul Gardner, end in interesting places?
What opportunities have you come across for creative change that you took?
What opportunities did you regret not taking?
April Sunday 
Submitted Comment:
Writing a longer piece takes the thought process of a saint. I'll live the thing for weeks, all the while writing on. Creativity best in the morning as stories go into dream mode.
I take it one session at a time really, little planning and mostly imagining the next scene. Atmosphere is the best for me; smell of coffee, low chatter of patrons, music in headphones and I can write for hours sipping from a mug of java.
The Sea
Submitted Comment:
Your newsletter was really great, it speaks from the past and not from the dry pages of books and speeches. In the first Para you wrote, 'known from the beginning accept for the actions' - shouldn't it be 'except for the actions'?!
You are probably right, spell checkers are wondrous things but they can’t divine if the misspelled word is actually right for the sentence or not!
C. Don
Submitted Comment:
Pookie,
This is the best time of all for your story. The magical time. You are about to let the muse talk back to you.
How many times have I finished a piece, gave it to readers, and received back from them interpretations that I never even thought of.
Every edit you make now is just opening the door for the muse to enter. Your side of the tail has been told. Now, let them speak.
Clint
Lynn McKenzie
Submitted Comment:
I enjoyed your comments about your novel and its development. I agree that no work ever turns out quite as we expect and that usually it disappoints the author in some fashion. The stories I've written usually have an ending, but they also contain surprises to me at times--often ones important to the plot! Thanks for the input.
Lorien
Submitted Comment:
To be certain: I create prolifically. Of course, I finish rather sparingly...
A lovely newsletter. Thanks for the read.
Cass--Autumn Spirit 
Submitted Comment:
Wow! Thanks for featuring my piece "Creating Sacred Space". It's nice to know that people are reading!
dusktildawn
Submitted Comment:
Oh my - I can certainly relate, Pookie. Although our genres are different, the angst is the same. I too felt the same thing as I concluded my book; sitting back and pondering as to whether all was portrayed the way I wanted and the tantamount question - would the correct message be received by a reader? I still shudder thinking back on that LONG editing, stressful, worrying week. For now, I can only keep my fingers crossed that I succeeded.
C. Don
Submitted Comment:
Deadlines? Who really cares? What I write is available when I say it is. Of course, it helps to be retired and healthy both physically and financially. I pity the writer who has to submit something before he is satisfied with it. It sucks the juice out of your self-esteem.
Nighala a.k.a. Doxie Do-Right
Submitted Comment:
Dear Pookie,
I think I suffer from an affliction known to many of us, I am sparingly prolific. There are long periods when nothing gets done, but then suddenly and in a giant burst of a sprinter for the finish, I am inundated with ideas and concepts that find their way to the page. It can be a challenge to write it all down, but when the slow periods come, I've got plenty to keep me busy.
Nighala
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Product Type: Toys & Games
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For Authors: July 05, 2006 Issue [#1137]
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