Big Magic

Big Magic

Being a creative -- and I mean, all humans are creatives; we just choose whether or not we want to harness that creativity and allow it to explode into brilliance into the world, of if we’d feel more comfortable and stable without letting it take over and drive us forward, and instead replace it with more logic-thinking tactics.

In Big Magic, Elizabeth Gilbert discusses the theory of inspiration and ideas, and chooses to objectify them as their own living, existing things. She delves into this wonderful dance investigating their patterns, stating that one minute they’re fleeting like wild untamed horses into your mind, and the next thing you know they’ve vanished, unkempt, longing to be cultivated through the right channel, the right being. They may stick around for a while, they may wait for you to recognize them pulsing, beating, prodding --- and if you choose to dismiss them, ignore them, or aren’t dedicated to them, they simply move on, only to slap someone else inside the heart and say WAKE UP! Do me! And then that person does; they choose to run with it and make something magic.

She declares, “I saw this incident as a rare and glittering piece of evidence that all my most outlandish beliefs about creativity might actually be true - that ideas are alive, that ideas do seek the most available human collaborator, that ideas do have a conscious will, that ideas do move from soul to soul, that ideas will always try to seek the swiftest and most efficient conduit to the earth, just as lightning does.”

And so, with that in mind, even though certain ideas simply just aren’t the right fit for us - what about the ones that are? The ones that get our gears moving and ignite that little flame inside our soul that begs us to jump out of bed at 3 in the morning and go write it down on a notepad before you can forget it because you’re just so perfectly suited for each other? Will we do it the disservice of ignoring it? Or ourselves, for that matter? How can we allow our little conscious Ego to step aside and budge over and quit being such a damn realist for a minute and live in optimism and the right-now and just trust that it will all work out?

We are almost conditioned to not be ‘brave enough’ or ‘silly enough’ to go after our creative passions. The stigma of a starving artist is just too common for loved ones and strangers alike to feel comfortable enough to judge those who are willing to just hone in on their lust for creating and ignore the rest. And this is a silly thought - why should we be demonized for loving to create? Film, books, art… these are all forms of entertainment and allowing yourself to flick an ‘off’ switch that most people enjoy, well, enjoying. So why are they often the ones who are pointing a finger at the ones creating them to “get a real job” or “do something practical with their life?” It hardly seems fair, and yet this is the norm. Even in a society that is always growing and evolving now more than ever to cherish, celebrate, and get excited over all these new ideas and inventions and projects, it’s simply easiest to just shrug it off and make them feel bad for following it up and chasing the dream, because to them it’ll always be a chase, and it’s something that they’re probably not brave enough to risk.

That being said, those who are willing to “risk it all” by simply having faith in themselves, trusting the universe, allowing the law of attraction to work its magic, are the richest of all (in my opinion), because they have that perseverance to move full steam ahead despite the fears or self doubting that pops up, and they create things they love, and they listen to those ideas that tap them on the shoulder or burst through the bedroom door in the middle of the night and they bring them to life. And that’s some big magic.

 

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