The Fountain
January 8, 2008 · by Christine
The Fountain
Don’t say, don’t say there is no water
to solace the dryness at our hearts.
I have seen
the fountain springing out of the rock wall
and you drinking there. And I too
before your eyes
found footholds and climbed
to drink the cool water.
The woman of that place, shading her eyes,
frowned as she watched-but not because
she grudged the water,
only because she was waiting
to see we drank our fill and were
refreshed.
Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.
That fountain is there among its scalloped
green and gray stones,
it is still there and always there
with its quiet song and strange power
to spring in us,
up and out through the rock.
-Denise Levertov
I’ve been experiencing a fountain in my life these days. I am grateful for this surge of creative energy and inspiration. I think it was really sparked while leading our Awakening the Creative Spirit program in November and has not abated since then. Not that I haven’t had some days here and there where I’ve felt tired and somewhat less inspired, but mostly I am just relishing this gift for what it is — a chance to extend myself in new ways and discover myself in the process.
In the past, when I would go through these waves of creative energy I would enter into them but always with a bit of hesitancy. There was a part of myself that feared it would be over too soon, or wondered if I might never be able to rise with that wave again. This response comes from a place of scarcity, a sense that there might not be enough. “Enough-ness” has long been an issue for me, and probably why I continually remind my students in art workshops that what they do is always “enough.” I say it again and again until they believe it, until I believe it. And the gift is that I really do now. I no longer live in fear of when this time of abundance will wane. Perhaps it comes from having lived through enough ebbing and flowing to realize that often when the creative energy dissipates it means I am being called back inward to rest and renew. I need to go drink my fill again. And when the surge is rising, I dance in its splendor and joy. I celebrate the fountain that exists at the heart of everything.
What are the ways in which you experience the rise and fall of your creative energies? Do you live in fear that there will not be more inspiration? In this season are you being called to renew yourself or extend your gifts into this world?
-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts
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Posted in Poetry, Creativity, Art and Spirituality |
January 8th, 2008 at 3:58 am
The Levertov is beautiful. May we all find footholds and climb.
My biggest problem with my creative energies is lack of confidence. Although it’s improving, I feel that I’m “not good enough” to come out and play with the big boys and girls. I don’t have any background or training in this stuff, and every time I make, say, a collage that looks like something a six-year-old would put together, I get embarrassed and throw it away. Instead I need to learn from it. (It’s partly to do with being an Enneagram 3 - we are driven to excel and achieve, and have a terrible fear of failure. Or perhaps more accurately to be SEEN as failures.)
The other problem I have is of scattered energy. One creative project sparks off a thousand other ideas that I have difficulty capturing. But I’m re-reading Barbara Sher’s book “What do I do when I want to do everything” (published as “Refuse to Choose” in the States). It’s aimed at people she calls Scanners, people who are “genetically wired to pursue many interests and goals.” She has loads of techniques for capturing those interests and combining everything one loves in order to “create a life of variety, challenge and joy”.
Hmmm, I seem to have gone off at a bit of a tangent, but you did ask about the rise and fall in our creative energies!
January 8th, 2008 at 9:12 am
I have poverty consciousness around my writing. I feel like there are only so many words in me, so many poems. I go through these wicked dry spells in which I write nothing, and then I fear I’m finished for good.
I always come back around to it, though. You’d think after almost forty years I’d have figured out that it’s a cycle, and one that always brings me back to scribbling furiously in the wee hours.
January 8th, 2008 at 9:34 am
Tess,
I am definitely a “Scanner” and I struggle with inadequacy in this area but I truly love the arts. This couldn’t have come at a better time, as I was bemoaning the fact that I made this quite clear yesterday.
Silly question…but when you all write poems, do they just come immediately? Or do you write and rewrite and rewrite?
January 8th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
Tess, thank you so much for mentioning the Sher book, sounds right up my alley. One of my biggest struggles is wanting to do too many things! I just ordered my copy. I find the confidence piece gets easier with time, each time I risk it seems I get affirmed and more courage. Great response!
Cat, thanks for sharing about your own cycles, maybe naming it now will help next time you are in a dry spell? Or perhaps there is another name for it that would help to reframe it in a different light?
Suz, to respond to your poem question, I have poems sometimes just come to me, but more often I craft and craft and re-write and re-write.
January 8th, 2008 at 1:49 pm
Christine,
I also wanted you to know that I finally have “broken through” the “make art” barrier and I had two joyous days of working on my art journal. I even bought a second one so I have one I can constantly work on at home. All I can say is that it was pure, primal pleasure…like childhood play! I used my Twinkling H20’s for the first time and I LOVED them.
Thanks for the good words about the poem…there is hope. I so long to write poems and make art!!!
xo.
Suz
January 8th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
I have discovered, thanks to Ms Cameron, that I am actually fearful of expanding my creativity, of growing into it. I don’t know why exactly - maybe I’m scared the fire of it will consume me. I think that’s why so many creatives drink and take drugs. So for me it’s just a looking at it and acknowledging it and seeing what happens. Just walking on doing The Artist’s Way (with a bit of lagging over the past few weeks, I must confess) and seeing what happens.
January 8th, 2008 at 10:40 pm
Christine, thank you for the beautiful poem and post. I can definitely relate and just moments ago wrote about experiencing, and more importantly *accepting*, the exact opposite — creative emptiness: http://zenamoon.typepad.com/weblog/2008/01/tuesday-fluff.html
Blessings to you!
January 8th, 2008 at 10:57 pm
Suz, how wonderful to hear about the breakthrough! If you long to write poems and make art then that’s exactly what you should be doing.
Sue, I am glad you are finding the Artist’s Way fruitful. I loved it when I worked on it several years ago. I think fear of our own power does play a big part in it.
Thanks Carla, yes accepting those times when we don’t feel creative at all as a time of renewal can be such a gift. Blessings to you too!
January 9th, 2008 at 8:11 am
yikes! i saw so much in this post and now in the comments that i don’t even know where to begin. i am wondering if that makes me “a scanner”? i used to feel so organized and now that this artistic bent seems to be taking over my life, i feel like i am on one huge, amazing rabbit trail with twists and turns at every point. the books to read…the blogs to explore…the poems to write…the photos to take..the time to just sit & ponder…whew! it all makes my head spin AND i love it.
re: the last question, “are you being called to renew yourself or extend your gifts into this world?” it feels like both at the same time. is that possible?
January 9th, 2008 at 10:15 am
lucy, I often feel alternately overwhelmed and inspired. I definitely think it is possible to be called to both renewal and extension at the same time.