Inviting inspiration
Ideas come to me like birds that I see in the corner of my eye, and I may try or may not to get a closer fix on those birds.
This is the beginning of the documentary Loving Highsmith, which is about the author Patricia Highsmith. The image reminds me of how the female poet I mentioned in the Natural Talent text describes how inspiration comes flying at her.
Whatever words and images we choose to describe the inspiration and the creative process, it is the same experience we are trying to convey.
The fact that it differs from person to person is natural, of course, because we are all different. It's also natural because what we're trying to describe is beyond the natural. It doesn't matter what we call it, supernatural or perfectly natural, it's all the same thing:
Something formless that wants to take one form or another.
It is then up to us, the creator, to decide how we deal with it and whether it leads to anything at all. We can decide to invite inspiration, or we can decide to look away.