Honoring and Serving Your Muse

Honoring and Serving Your Muse

reducir el estres le hace*

As creative, sentient beings, we owe much to our muse, that inner voice that inspires us to write, to paint, to draw and to create.  That inner self that calls us to a blank sheet of paper, an empty canvas, a block of wood, or a piece of stone.  That sense of identity that does not allow us to go one day without practicing our craft, which lets us know we are out of balance when we do not honor our craft on a daily regular basis. That inner spirit that lets us know if we are on the right track or not, or steers us into a totally different direction.   It is this muse, this inner friend, internal companion that drives us to have to write, to sing, to draw, to paint, to create, even when we are not feeling well, even when we are not inspired.

Virgen up close*

Now, don’t get me wrong here, I am not romanticizing the muse.  I don’t feel that muses are by any means inspiring us day and night to be the best we can be at our craft…instead, after talking to many creative sentient beings about their craft, their process for creating, and the pain of producing the just right product, I think our muses are the bane of our existence and well as the source of our inspiration and well being.

I tend to think of my muse as a little bit like Tinker Bell…she has a personality of her own, and can be simultaneously inspiring and stimulating, as well as, bratty, and stubborn, and a know-it-all, At times, my muse can even be, are you ready for this…downright argumentative, belligerent, and quarrelsome.

I have been known to have conversations with my muse along the lines of:

“I like this title.”

“No you don’t, you just think you like it, but in reality, you know you need a better one.”

“NO this one is just fine, stop bugging me.”

“Now you know it’s not right and you’ll eventually have to change it anyway, so just listen to me and change it now.”

“No, I like this title.”

“Fine, be stubborn, you know I’m right, that’s why you have that nagging feeling that something is not right.”

Or

“What are you writing, Miguel would never say that.”

“Yes, he would, he just did, see…”

“Yeah, but that’s wrong…doesn’t sound like him.”

“Ok, miss smarty pants, what does sound like him?”

“I don’t know, he’s your character, you decide.”

“You are not being much help here.”

But, then there are days when I get nothing but Pixie dust from my Tinker Bell and I will write for hours, that seem like minutes and the writing flows effortlessly. Those are the days when I know my muse and I are communicating as one.  It is the sort of day that just happens out of the blue…you wake up and you are best friends with your muse and you write 2,000, 3,000 or even 4,000 words and they are all pretty good and you are left feeling like the moon, the sun and the stars are all lined up to make you a success, that the universe is on your side, and that YES, you have chosen the right profession.

Lotus*

However rare those days for those of us who are creative sentient beings, we live for them, we live to recreate them, we are driven, as if in search of a fountain of eternal happiness or that “fix”, that pixie dust of magic that sustains us and keeps us going.     

So I have to ask, are those great days just an accident, or do we make them happen by serving and honoring our muse? When our muse is pampered, are we rewarded?

Con un pan y cafecito

Seguimos adelante

Zulmara

Más hace una hormiga andando que un buey echado.

An ant on the move does more than a dozing bull.

*Artowrk for this blog was graciously provided by Maria Sanchez an artist on Art by Latina Artists