Sometimes when I am writing or creating, it feels like I am merely the channel that helps the work express itself. There has always been a magic to creativity. In her book, Big Magic, Elizabeth Gilbert explain it like this . . .

“I am referring to the supernatural, the mystical, the inexplicable, the surreal, the divine, the transcendent, the other-worldly. Because the truth is, I believe that creativity is a force of enchantment – not entirely human in its origins. . . the creative process is both magical and magic.”

I really like her idea that ideas are things that already exist. It reminds me a bit about what Stephen King says about writing. He writes, “Stories are found things, like fossils in the ground. . . Stories are relics, part of an undiscovered preexisting world. The writer’s job is to use the tools in his or her toolbox to get as much of each one out of the ground intact as possible.”

Gilbert takes this a step further and suggests that stories and ideas are living creatures that seek a human host to help express themselves. She writes, “I believe that our planet in inhabited not only by animals and plants and bacteria and viruses, but also by ideas. Ideas are a disembodied, energetic life-form. They are completely separate from us, but capable of interacting with us – albeit strangely. Ideas have no material body, but they do have consciousness, and they most certainly have will. Ideas are driven by a single impulse: to be made manifest. And the only way an idea can be made manifest in our world is through collaboration with a human partner. It is only through a human’s effort that an idea can be escorted out of the ether and into the realm of the actual.”

What an amazing idea. You can pull an idea out of thin air or get an idea out of the blue because that is exactly where the ideas are.

“… ideas spend eternity swirling around us, searching for available and willing human partners.”

And when you pick up an idea, it will work with you to come to life on the page.

“The idea sensing your openness, will start to do it’s work on you . . . The idea will organize coincidences and portents to tumble across your path, to keep your interest keen . . . The idea will not leave you alone until it has your full attention.”

That is the magic of creativity. This is something I want to share with my students. Maybe you will want to do the same.

Teaching Tip Tuesdays – ideas and inspiration for you and your students