Creative Inspiration

This piece first appeared on my blog at Soulseeds, where I post several times a week.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been exploring some of the key features of intention; whether it relates to a relationship, career, goal or vision. This is the third in the series.

First I wrote about the power of intention, where you visualize an end point and work backwards, best described by Michelangelo who said about his masterpiece the Statue of David: “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” The second week I spoke about perseverance, intention’s close companion. When you are truly jazzed by your vision of the future, you hustle to make it happen. You do what it takes, trying things, being willing to fall down, get back up and push through any number of obstacles to get where you want to be.

I had a vague idea where I wanted to take this next, but it wasn’t clear and I struggled to find clarity. If I had been been using a typewriter there would have been scrunched up paper flying around the room, the pile of paper rubble a reminder of my frustrating cognitive cul de sac. My stream of consciousness had dried to a trickle. All I had was the one word “creativity” but no idea why this word was significant. Finally, after struggling for several days, it all fell into place like the last pieces of a jigsaw puzzle while I was riding my bike. Eureka! The third topic is inspiration, the counterpart to perseverance. Alongside the need for effort, I add the role of effortless effort. Suddenly all my ideas fell into place easily. I completed the piece in about 30 minutes.

Here’s a question as it relates to the theme? How long did it take to write this article- 30 minutes or 3 days? When did the preparation begin- 3 days before or a lifetime ago? Maybe everything that has ever happened leads to this moment and falls together in this theme. And who wrote the article? Well I put the pieces together but whole networks of people conspired to make it possible. That is the awesome power of inspiration. You are not alone. You don’t have to do it all yourself. All you need to do is tap into the limitless power that is within and around you all the time, and let it flow.

Inspiration- Where Does It Come From?
On the one hand, most of life’s great achievements come about through determined, hard work. For example, world famous Cellist, Pablo Casals practiced every day for 4 hours. Someone once asked him, 'Mister Casals, you are a master, you have accomplished so much. Why do you keep practicing four hours a day even though you are 93 years old?' He said, 'Well, I'm finally beginning to notice some improvement.' Legend has it that he even completed his daily regimen of scales on the morning that he died. So on the one hand, Casals is an example of the truth of persistent, hard work.

On the other hand, some of life’s great achievements appear effortless. You hear of people who sit down and write whole books in a matter of days or weeks as if the words are dropping straight from the sky into their brains and from there to their fingers and screen. The great composer, Handel, composed The Messiah in three weeks without leaving his house. Another composer, Mozart, said that his music often presented itself to his imagination as if from nowhere. He had no choice but to stop what he was doing and write the music down. It was as if something beyond his own consciousness was writing his symphonies.

So which is it? Is true inspiration effortless or hard work? Maybe it’s both at the same time. The playwright, Arthur Miller was once asked in an interview, “Are you writing another play?" His answer was brilliant. He said, "I don't know, but I probably am."

Are you working on something brilliant and inspirational right now? Probably. When did it start? At the beginning of time. Who are you working with? All the creative energy that exists. The philosopher Daniel Dennett once posed the question,

How long did it take Bach to create the St Matthew’s Passion? An early version was performed in 1727 but the version we listen to today dates from ten years later and includes many revisions. How long did it take to create Bach? He had the benefit of 42 years of living when the first version was heard and more than half a century when the later version was completed. How long did it take to create Christianity without which St Matthews Passion by Back or anyone else would be inconceivable? About two millennia. How long did it take to create the social and cultural context in which Christianity could be born? Somewhere between a hundred millennia and 3 million years depending on when we decide to date the birth of human culture. And how long did it take to create homo sapiens? Between three and four billion years, roughly the same length of time it took to create daisies and snail darters, blue whales and spotted owls. Billions of years of irreplaceable design work.

The counterpart to attaining your intentions through perseverance is to tap into the energy of inspiration that is already there and just waiting for you. You just haven’t connected to it yet. You can understand that in a very logical and systematic way like Daniel Dennett because everything is constantly being created whether you realize it or not, or you can think of it in more of a synchronistic way like Wayne Dyer who said, “It's the difference between motivation and inspiration. Motivation is when you get hold of an idea and don't let go of it until you make it a reality. Inspiration is the reverse- when an idea gets hold of you and you feel compelled to let that impulse or energy carry you along. You get to a point where you realize that you're no longer in charge, that there's a driving force inside you that can't be stopped.”

You know this experience. It happens at moments of surrender, maybe after some resistance or struggle. You stop the struggle and move with intuition. Maybe you surrender to new love or a new opportunity. It doesn’t necessarily make logical sense at the time, but you jump anyway. It’s inspired. It feels fateful, like it was meant to be and all you do is hold on for the ride.

Creative Energy is Playful
One of the ways to remind yourself that there is a field of intention, or collective genius, or however you describe the latent powers around you, is to remember that creative energy is playful. One of my favorite comedians, Ricky Gervais, does a satire on reading the Genesis creation story literally and in particular the creation of light.

God created the heaven and the earth….. IN THE DARK. How good is that? I would have created a little bit of light, then taken a look and said, “Right, I need some planets.”

He went, “Zap. That’s everything. Now let’s have a look. Brilliant! Then He made man out of dust…. just because he could.”

Compared to a lot of violent creation myths, the Genesis creation story has a certain playfulness about it. For a start it all happens out of God’s nostrils. If you look at your nostrils in the mirror for long enough, you have to laugh. They are funny looking things, not the most dignified part of the human anatomy and not the first part of the body you associate with the creation of the universe. Yet the story says that all of life emanated from the nostrils of God. Psalm 104 described the creator “stretching out the heavens like a tent.” You have to have a sense of fun to parallel the creation of the universe with pitching a tent. All I can say is that we’re very lucky that I wasn’t the creator. If you had seen some of the tents I’ve pitched in my time. The universe would be collapsing back in on all of us in the middle of a rainy night. Creative energy manifests intentions out of raw imagination and whatever resources are available at the time. Inspiration doesn’t have to be grand. It can be real and fun.

The value in bringing playfulness into your intentions is captured in the Chinese phrase Wu Wei. I think of it as “get out of wu wei, or get out of your own way.” Wu Wei means effortless effort.

Blossoms like a flower, flows like a river, reaches like a tree.

Wu wei is like water. You get in the flow, get out of the way of your own limiting voice of doubt, and enjoy the journey. This is an important principle in setting intentions. You want to keep your eyes open, and keep looking around, but you don’t want to overlook your intuitive insight.

I learnt this lesson when I was in England for my brother’s wedding. In good English tradition we shot clay pigeons on the morning of the wedding. It turns out that when it comes to shooting, I’m about as accurate as Dick Cheney. The instructor kept saying, “Don’t think about it. Just shoot.” He was right. See it and shoot. Don’t think about. See it and shoot. It’s tempting to second guess yourself and shoot where you think its going. Every time I second guessed myself and waited, I missed. Every time I followed my instincts and shot immediately I hit it.

How does clay pigeon shooting relate to inspiration? Combine the two big ideas of this article. You are ALWAYS preparing for each moment, and DON’T over think, then you come to a beautiful balance for setting intentions. Everything that happens in your life is building your wisdom and resources. At the same time, everything you need is available right now for whatever act of creation is required. It is both hard work, perseverance AND inspiration all at the same time.

The famous scientists, Watson and Crick, are great examples of the principle of minimal effort. You might imagine they worked around the clock in their ground breaking discovery of DNA. In fact, Watson played hours of tennis every afternoon, and apparently went to Cambridge parties every night. Crick rarely turned up to work before 10am and then took a coffee break within an hour. They apparently lost interest in their study of DNA at various points and made some of their most significant discoveries standing in line at the Lab’s Cafeteria. This is often the way with inspired intention.

Whether it’s riding your bike, goofing around at parties or walking the dog, some of your most creative moments happen when your mind is open and receptive but not stressed and strained. Fun is not just fun. It also reminds you to surrender control of the outcomes and join in the thrill of creative interchange. This leaves you open and ready to receive the inspiration you need and want.

Creativity and Inspiration
Break the idea down a little further. Where is the mind- is it contained in the brain, or does it extend further than your own brain? What is the relationship between the individual mind and its environment? Think about this classic thought experiment. Two people are travelling to a museum at the same time. One of them is of sound mind and the other one has Alzheimer’s. One knows the way to the museum by memory. The other one with Alzheimer’s Disease has the directions to the museum written in a notebook. They both arrive at the museum at the same time. Which one is using their mind? We more easily equate memory with mind but they are both clearly using their minds. The mind of the second person extends to include the notebook. His notebook is part of his mind. He created the system, trusts it and uses it to inform his memory.

Technology takes the idea of an extended mind even further than a notebook. Do you remember when TiVo first came out? It records television shows based on past choices. There was a famous case in the early 2000s about the guy who complained that TiVo thought he was gay because it kept recording shows with gay themes. He tried to correct TiVo’s assumption by overcompensating and recording lots of violent war movies and wrestling shows. TiVo then decided he was an insane Nazi and recorded documentaries on the Third Reich. His story ended up as an episode on the comedy show The King of Queens.

It’s clearly not always right, but TiVo is an example of technology where you extend your mind to interact with your environment. Now Amazon will send you suggestions based on patterns in your purchases. Google is an even more sophisticated form of technology that extends your mind. The more strategic you are with the wording of your search, the more helpful the answers will be. I found a site called Funny Google, which puts your own name in place of the Google logo, making the experience even more personalized. Now your google search is a literal extension of your mind and identity.

Whether it’s a notebook, a slide rule, TiVo or Google, these are all ways of taking your mind out into the world and letting your environment help you think.

Beyond technology, conversation is a way of putting people together and bouncing ideas off each other, to the point where you might say “Whose idea was that anyway?”

When you think of DNA, you most likely think of Watson and Crick. But very few people have heard of Rosalind Franklin who was instrumental in Watson and Crick’s discoveries. In 2003, Dr. Raymond Damadian spent $300,000 to place ads in major newspapers claiming that he should have been included in the Nobel Prize for the invention of the MRI, and not the two scientists who were given credit for the invention in the early 1970s.

Creative energy is like that. It is a process and a network. You can’t always tell who is responsible and you can’t always tell when discoveries are made because many people and many energies collaborate in new advances and they are happening all the time.

It’s the same with intentions. You have to believe them to see them. Picture a bold intention for your life or the world. Hold it steady in your mind with detail and clarity. Add in a burst of perseverance to the image, something that signifies a never say die attitude. Then add in a large dose of surrender to the latent powers of inspiration.

There is nothing you can’t achieve if you partner with the creative energy of the universe that wants you to succeed, and will support your efforts if you have good intent.

You are making a difference, and having fun doing it. In the immortal words of Sinatra, “do it wu wei” and get in the flow of life.

The Balance of Power

Power hangs in the balance in American politics. Doesn’t it always? That’s the pendulum of democracy. Absolute power corrupts, but balanced power corrects. It’s the same with personal growth. Power always hangs in the balance. It rests in the middle. There is no absolute power, just a balance of sometimes competing interests. The pendulum swings between acceptance and change, conviction and doubt, optimism and despair, nature and nurture. Peace lies in the elusive resting space in the middle.

Are you anxious about the results of the elections, maybe contemplating your biannual move to Canada? What do you do with this anxiety? How do you face massive social problems without becoming paralyzed and inactive? How do you have firm convictions without becoming judgmental? How do you balance being and doing when the “to do” list is so long? Can you take resolute action without absolute knowledge? These are some of the questions raised by the balance of power.

There is a time and place for introspection, simply being. But there comes a time when to use the words of William Shakespeare, we must be “as good in act as we have been in thought.” The point is that your thoughts and your actions need to be in harmony. Action without thought is like shooting without aim. Thought without action is like staring at the sea and wondering why you’re not crossing it.

There is also a time and place for non action. Maybe you have heard the expression, “Don’t just do something. Stand there.” Sometimes being slow to act is wise. The phrase also hints at the quality to action that keeps you balanced. Stand firmly grounded in who you are at your core before, during and after action. This is balanced action.

Balanced action is nicely captured in the Taoist phrase wu wei, as in “it’s either my way or wu wei.” Wu wei is best translated as effortless effort. The Hindu scriptures, the Vedanta, uses a similar phrase “playful action.” Wu wei is a bird in flight or a horse at full stretch. Wu wei is a Roger Federer backhand or a Tiger Woods swing. Note that it’s possible to have wu wei in certain areas of your life and very little mastery in others.

Wu Wei is something I aspire to practice more often in my life and in more areas of my life. I aspire to action that is effective and makes a difference, but action that also increases the peace rather than adding to the drama. Imagine the state of our world if all the frantic, nervous energy around these elections was channeled into playful action.

Peruvian Shaman, Carlos Castaneda described effortless effort like this-”If a warrior is to succeed at anything, the success must come gently, with a great deal of effort but with no stress or obsession.”

The Bible’s creation story offers a beautiful example of wu wei. There’s something playful about the whole story. The Creator warrior of Genesis seemed to have effortless effort down pat. Psalm 104 got it in one sentence, describing the Creator “stretching out the heavens like a tent.” You have to have a sense of fun to parallel the creation of the universe with pitching a tent. All I can say is that we’re very lucky that I wasn’t the creator. If you had seen some of the tents I’ve pitched in my time. The universe would be collapsing back in on all of us in the middle of a rainy night. Creative energy manifests beauty out of raw imagination and whatever resources are available at the time.

Wu wei is clearly something we all aspire to, but rarely achieve. Don’t beat yourself up. Trying not to try is not the wu wei way. You don’t have to solve all the problems of the world. You don’t even have to get close to it. Just take one step in one area of your life and make it a goosestep to remind yourself that this can be fun. Sometimes the only thing stopping action is that you get in your own way. Get out from under your own feet, and get active.

How can you tell if you are acting with too much effort? You see it in the mirror and you feel it in your body. You look and feel miserable. Maybe you even need to feel miserable to purge your guilt. Wu wei is action that is pure joy to perform. You aren’t purging any guilty conscience or fearful karma. You aren’t trying to prove you are a good person, and you don’t need to be thanked for effortless effort. You often don’t even realize you’ve done anything.

A story out of the Taoist tradition captures wu wei- a woman accidentally fell into the river rapids leading to a high and dangerous waterfall. Onlookers feared for her life. Miraculously, she came out alive and unharmed downstream at the bottom of the falls. People asked her how she managed to survive. “I accommodated myself to the water, not the water to me. Without thinking, I allowed myself to be shaped by it. Plunging into the swirl, I came out with the swirl. This is how I survived.”

The Tao Te Ching says, “The Master can act without doing anything and teach without saying a word. Things come her way and she does not stop them; things leave and she lets them go. She has without possessing, and acts without any expectations. When her work is done, she takes no credit. That is why it will last forever… For those who practice effortless action, everything will fall into place.”

Seize the moment with passion and conviction. Act decisively without fully knowing the personal cost. Trust your wise knowledge that can tell the difference between what can and should be changed NOW, and what is best left alone, at least for the time being. Your effortless action is an antidote to despair. Playful actions make your life long dreams a present reality.

Merge your actions with the flow of life, seeking the purest of motives and the broadest of compassion. When creative power is balanced, the game plays the player, music composes the composer, the poem writes the poet, you can’t tell the dance and dancer apart, the dream and the dreamer become one, subject and object merge, and all of life gains a natural flow. Action becomes easier, less anxious, more joyful. Wu wei open doors you never imagined and hadn’t even seen.

If Election Day has left you feeling all at sea, take a long look at the oceanic wisdom that resides deep within you. Stand upright and strong at the shore. Then dive in. But make sure it’s a cannonball or a can opener, or even a belly flop. It’s got to be fun, or else you could make a big splash with little effect.

You’re making a difference in the world, and you’re having fun doing it.

Soulseeds offers “Secret agents of Kindness” cards for children (Home editon and School editions) that teach kids that kindness can also be great fun. This is a perfect gift for a classroom or home to remind all children that they can make a difference in the world and have fun doing it.

Obama and Effortless Effort

What a momentous day. It’s the inauguration of President Obama. I can’t even comprehend the pressure and expectation that is piled on the man from all around the world. He seems to handle it all so effortlessly. I’m enormously grateful for him, for his family and I’m grateful for the incredible groundswell of new energy that is sweeping our weary world.

Obama seems to have mastered the art of wu wei, effortless effort, playful action. Its something I aspire to practice more often in my life. Action that is effective and makes a difference, but action that also increases the peace rather than adding to the drama. Imagine the state of our world if all the Obama energy could be chanelled into playful action.

Carlos Castaneda described effortless effort well- ”If a warrior is to succeed at anything, the success must come gently, with a great deal of effort but with no stress or obsession.” (the link takes you to my friend Brian's great site Philosophers Notes, where he has all sorts of inspirational quotes from Castaneda and many others- worth a look)

While I was thinking about effortless effort, I kept coming back to the Bible’s creation story. There’s something playful about the whole story that captures my imagination. The Creator warrior of Genesis seemed to have effortless effort down pat. Psalm 104 got it in one sentence, describing the Creator “stretching out the heavens like a tent.” You have to have a sense of fun to parallel the creation of the universe with pitching a tent. All I can say is that we’re all very lucky that I wasn’t the creator. If you could only have seen some of the tents I’ve pitched in my time. The universe would be collapsing back in on all of us in the middle of a rainy night.

Ricky Gervais is one of my favorite comedians. He gives a beautiful account of the Genesis creation story as effortless effort. Excuse the language, be prepared to weep with laughter and if you’re short for time, just watch the first few minutes



God created the heaven and earth in the dark, then created light….he said “that’s everything, lets have a look, brilliant.” I love it.

My sermon this past Sunday was on action as a universal spiritual value. It seems that most of the world religions try to hold a balance between thought and action, faith and works. Maybe the only way to hold the balance is through effortless action. I spoke about a dream I had where I met Obama and we shared a light, effortless, moment.

Read the sermon if you want to find out about the dream, as well as some thoughts on effortless effort, and the amazing “Sully” Sullenberger who brought down a plane last week on the Hudson with some of his own effortless action.

I want to live my life with that impact- great effort, but minimal stress and attachment.