All quotes from
Shaun's book
The discipline of
creation is a mix of surrender and initiative.
We let go of inhibitions, which breed rigidity, and we cultivate
responsiveness to what is taking shape in the immediate situation.
The creative person,
like the energy of creation, is always moving.
There is an understanding that the process must keep changing.
Creativity is an
intelligence that is broader than the experience of an individual person acting
alone.
There is a value to
doing things wholeheartedly without being attached to what you do.
Trusting the process
is based on the realization that creation is a complex interaction of many
elements that collectively shape the future.
Creativity cannot
flourish and reach its deepest potential without the participation of its
demons as well as its angels.
It is always hard to
see that doubt, fear, and indirectness are eternal aspects of the creative
path.
Transformation
occurs when we lose our way and find a new way to return.
Trusting the process
is based on a belief that something valuable will emerge when we step into the
unknown.
Mistakes break the
continuities of intention with slips and distortions.
The mistake is a
message that calls for attention.
If you view your
life as an ongoing invention, mistakes shed their onerous nature. The only
serious deficit involves the inability to respond.
Mistaken moves and
slips of intention reveal that creation involves more than single-mindedness.
The idea of mistaken
gestures begins to vanish when every movement is viewed as expressive in its
own right.
Once we realize that
artists are themselves expressions of
every conceivable way of living, we can begin to appreciate variations of
creative types.
The unusual
mannerisms of prominent artists tend to obscure the fact that many of history's
greatest creators, and the vast majority of people who express themselves
creatively each day, live ordinary lives and work at relatively mainstream
jobs. It is possible to create at the
highest levels of quality while still working in a bank, teaching school,
painting houses, or toiling in a factory.
As I reflect on my
life, no matter how busy I am, the time is usually there for creation, but I
may choose to do other things.
The opportunities
available to the creator are as varied as life itself. This way of looking at creation establishes
strong bridges with spirituality, especially traditions like Tibetan Buddhism
and Native American religion, in which every aspect of the physical world is
both an expression of the creative spirit and an opening to its contemplation.
We are all expert at
something, and the extent to which we do something unusual with this ability is
largely a matter of commitment.
The idea of ritual
reinforces simplicity, ordinariness, sanctity, heightened concentration, and
the sense that something important is happening.
What disturbs you
the most may have the most to offer.
The most fundamental
skill of the creative person is the ability to constantly re-vision the world.
Everything is subject to reconstruction and renewal. The "re" factor is the basis of
resurrecting, reshaping, regenerating, reviving, and rejuvenating.
The creative way of
looking at the world assumes multiple truths and interactions among them.
The creative person
is comfortable with contradictory truths and constant changes because there is
an underlying faith in an all-enveloping process which embraces paradox and
movement.
Health and social
well-being are envisioned as a life-affirming interplay between the varied
elements of the world, and the dominance of a single position threatens the
well-being of the whole. Addictions and
obsessions occur when we lose the healthy interplay, when we don't respect
different ways of looking at the world.
Experiment with
reframing by contemplating your most elementary daily habits.
I look for the
greatest weaknesses in my life, in another person's life, or the culture of an
organization, with the belief that these areas are most receptive to creative
alchemization. There is a power of
reversal in extreme conditions that does not exist within the stable center.
Symptoms are signs
of opportunity, indications that other ways of operating may be needed.
Successful
relationships require ongoing attunement.
There is an
unrealized creative power that exist on the peripheries of our lives and in the
small things we do within our personal environments.
Loss awakens
intimacy.
Difficulties are the
unavoidable ingredients of life in the world.
Physical change is
not in itself a lasting solution to the soul's discontents.
Creators want to be
in situations where they are challenged, where unexpected things are presented
to them, and where they must instinctively respond in new ways.
Loss and longing are
preconditions of creation.
Visions…are shaped
incrementally through the total range of our life experiences. The vision doesn't simply arrive one day,
from above, and without connections to our previous experiences with the world just as dreams are shaped by our engagements
with the physical world, our visions are directions that emerge from
experience.
The most accessible
way of becoming more involved with the creative process is re-visioning what
you already do.
One of the first
steps in the practice of creating is to identify areas in your life where the
artistic consciousness is already at work but not fully appreciated.
Everything depends
upon the quality of attention you bring to experience.
Rather than try to
rid your life of tension, consider doing something more creative with it. Creative transformation of stress gives you
the opportunity to move out of the victim role that we often impose on ourselves.
Can the disturbing
thing be the messenger that suggests another way of living?
Childhood
imagination creates intimate relationships with what appear to be insignificant
places and objects. Although children
have a limited ability to travel alone through the world, they compensate with
a special aptitude to journey through the imagination.
Everything
significant about the soul's ultimate journey is imprinted in its childhood
formation.
Creativity is a
force moving through us, and only through practice do we learn how to cooperate
with it. The "process" is like
a muscle. It needs to be exercised in order
to function effortlessly.
Practice enables us
to act and not act at the same time.
Creation is a
response to life that gives something back to the source.
Giving up is also
part of the process. Surrendering,
quitting the chase.
