Creativity of the Moment

The Creativity of the Moment

By Shelley Klammer | Posted 7/28/06 | Updated 11/16/23

Looking back a year in my journal it said, "I rarely let my mind relax." Mmmm. Often these days I have to right myself. I am becoming more aware of when I am pushing myself and creating stress in my body and my mind and when I am relaxing and trusting a higher intelligence to operate in my life.

This morning nothing seemed to go right. I already had a full day's agenda listed in my head and somehow my joyful commitments to myself have become an enforced discipline. I have a collage commission to complete; I need to plan an art class. I have so much to "accomplish". When I am in this state even my creative/spiritual practices become another task to strike off my list. When I start skating along the surface of my life, I feel like I must do more to be more.

My daughter has a friend over and they want to go swimming. I am writing at the computer so I say no. Then they want to go for a walk. There is a black bear wandering the neighborhood so I say no. They want to make popcorn and watch a movie. I say ok. There is a brief quiet in the house. They bore of this quickly and shut off the TV when the popcorn is all eaten. This is all before 10 in the morning. "Mom, can we go in the pool?"

I set aside all the doing I think I should be doing and head poolside with my journal. As I write, I relax. My legs stick out in the sun and I rest my head in the shade of a blackberry bush. A monarch butterfly flutters over my journal. Transformation. A hummingbird buzzes near my ear. Joy. As I look to the sky, my life feels larger.

Under such a wide expanse of infinite blue I question much of my doing and its undertone of needing to advance. There is a hunger in me that ignores the creativity of the moment. There is a wanting that says, "Now is not enough."

Meanwhile the nourishment that life offers goes on with or without my noticing it. It speaks to me in symbol and subtlety and in butterflies and hummingbirds. The light dances on the pool and suddenly I understand that it is not what I do and accomplish but my attention to the creativity of the moment that moves and transforms my life.

Next: Creativity and the Shadow