Creativity As A Gift

Creativity Is A Responsible Gift

The mystics are artists, and the stuff in which they work is most often human life.

They want to heal the disharmony between the actual and the real; and since in the white-hot radiance of that faith, hope, and charity that burns within them, they discern that such a reconciliation is possible. They are able to work for it with a singleness of purpose and with an invincible optimism denied to other [men].

Evelyn Underhill-Practical Mysticism

Cited in Meditations for The New Age

Following on Fox, Aquinas, and the ethics of creativity, from this observation by Underhill, (who was a renowned and reliable scholar of the mystical approach to life and thought), we get an insightful affirmation of the creative impulse or the creative fire that dwells within each expressive action…

I am in awe of such irrepressible positive feelings as too often either the need for practicality or the influx of self-doubt can appear to dampen any of Underhill’s sense of creative fire… For me, at least sometimes, I will push through to find some inspiration… but not over-extend, as I have come to know that trying to force creativity is an oxymoron.  Other times, times of grace that guides and guards the flow of my ideas,

I am able to compose and connect ideas in ways that are more inspirational… well, at least informational!

I truly admire anyone-be they a mystic, an artist, a builder, or even a banker who has a “singleness of purpose” that grants them such unwavering confidence that they are engaged in meaningful and valuable pursuits of what is real, truthful, and good…

That ‘invincible optimism” is a gift… but it also contains a catch! 

Referring back to Aquinas and Fox, it has to be an ethically informed optimism and sense of purpose that does not run amok in the fields of ego and selfish pursuits of power and despotism. For me, as much as I admire the artistic qualities and the creative temperament, unless they are truly a benevolent mystic, their gifts can be distinctly in need of guidance and grace.