The Writer’s Muse – Where Does It Come From?
I read a post today at novelist Erika Robuck’s blog, Muse, called Catching the Muse. (You may remember Erika from an interview I did with her a couple of months ago.) In her post, Erika wonders about the source of creativity and the source of what many of us call the Muse. She directs readers to the video below in which Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love, discusses how she’s come to think of creativity and its source.
Even after watching Elizabeth’s talk on creativity, I don’t have a clear answer to Erika’s question, “Is the Muse internal or external?”, but I’ll take a stab at it anyway.
I think what I believe is that this Muse, creative genius, inspiration, whatever you want to call it, does not come from within or without. It is not internal or external. Instead, I feel like what we call the Muse is the connection between the internal and the external.
I believe in creative energy that exists outside of our own being. Haven’t you ever had a surge in creative ideas or thoughts when you visited a certain place or experienced a certain event? I also believe in creative energy that exists inside our own being. I find evidence for this in inspirational dreams and times when I have had to stifle my creativity only to have it burst out of me at the first opportunity. I think it is when those two energies connect that the “Muse” shows up and we find ourselves discovering something we didn’t know was in us and writing (or creating) “in the zone”.
For that reason, I really connected with what Elizabeth said about “showing up for your job”.
Don’t be daunted. Just do your job. Continue to show up for your piece of it, whatever that might be…If the divine, cockeyed genius assigned to your case decides to let some sort of wonderment be glimpsed, for just one moment through your efforts, then “Ole!” And if not, do your [job] anyhow. And “Ole!” to you, nonetheless…just for having the sheer human love and stubbornness to keep showing up.
It’s like when we do what we were meant to do—in our case, writing, but it could be any other creative pursuit—we are providing the opportunity for this connection of our own creative energy with the creative energy of the Universe (or God or the cosmos or whatever you want to call it). The Muse shows up, Genius arrives, Inspiration strikes, whenever it chooses. Our job is to get to work and be prepared for its arrival.
Posted in luring the muse, the writing life
December 9th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
Ahh, very interesting! It is what it is. Very philosophical response. Love it, Ami.
December 11th, 2009 at 6:47 am
[...] Ami Spencer asks, Where does the muse come from? She links to a video of Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love, talking about creativity. [...]
December 20th, 2009 at 11:19 pm
So. I FINALLY watched this all the way through. I like what she has to say, but it bothers me that she has to say it at all. This may sound naive, but I’d never heard of “the muse” or even much about writer’s anguish when I was a journalist. Journalists have a deadline, so they produce. They write, without complaining how hard it is. Of course, there are plenty of other things journalists complain about, but you’ll rarely hear them mutter a word about writing being difficult. They just do it.
This writer’s world is totally different. I never hear the end of the difficulty of writing — and I think I’ve let it affect my mindset, if only slightly. Sometimes when it gets hard, I let myself complain about writing being difficult instead of doing what I should be doing — writing.
So I think Elizabeth is right that we need to erase this from our memory, forget that writers have a history of anguish and difficulty. Because as she says, it’s my job. Gotta just do our jobs.
December 22nd, 2009 at 9:19 pm
Alexis – You make a good point that the writing professions that are considered less creative don’t rely as heavily on “the muse” (either for inspiration or as a crutch for their lack of writing). We should all treat writing as something we just do — muse or no muse.
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And without spoiling the ending at all, I will just say that it–and looking back, the rest of the film as well–will make you think, giving you a desire to re-watch it.
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