I have been thinking about this one a long time, and slightly hesitant to write about it. Whenever you start to approach to "center of reality", things get really fuzzy and hard to talk about because you are going where conventional rules cease to apply. As a result anything you write sounds a little bit crazy.
Creative people tend to understand, but not always, depending on their methods and personality.
First I want to look at the word "art". It has a common root with word "artificial" meaning "man-made", and there is no doubt that we are humans that create art. But it tends to make us look like we are phonies who are copying or imitating creation, and in a sense that is true. In the case of "writing with intention" (see other blogs), this may seem almost completely true.
But I am convinced that "inspired" work, to any degree has a source above and beyond any petty desire to imitate.
To relate this from my point of view I have to delve into a part of my background not yet discussed. I have long had an interest in Native American music, and the ancient songs passed down for many generations in particular. I have played, as a guest, on a number of native drum groups, sung with a rattle in sweat lodge and been invited to join at least 2 drum groups (or "drums" as they are referred to) but neither one panned out for different reasons.
As I understand it, the birth of most native songs is generally regarded as a spiritual event. The songs are usually regarded as "gifts from the spirit", and not the product of human invention. This fits perfectly with my experiences regarding the birth of songs and was easy for me to grasp.
During this period I had several experiences which tended to solidify this understanding.
The Indian way (at least as it was taught to me) was that if you needed a song, you prayed for it.
Once I was on a mountain for the purpose of prayer, and it was a good experience. All was well and I felt in tune with the universe. Despite being a songwriter and musician, I realized I didn't have a personal or "prayer" song. So I prayed for one.
Almost instantly, I heard a melody. It was in a voice like the wind but definitely NOT the wind. It was very much like my experience in the birth of the song "Freeway" (see my blog on "inspiration" at TomHawkRevisited) but much clearer. Again that "voice" was both old & young, male & female, high & low and everything in between at the same time.
Like "Freeway", the notes in the melody were not of the scales that humans use, but there could be no mistake of how to translate those notes. It could only be described as a "spirit voice".
In another, similar event, I used to raise gourds for the purpose of making my own rattles. One day I was checking on my gourd patch, and I remembered from something I had been told or read, that singing to your plants was helpful. So in good Indian fashion, I prayed for a "gourd-growing" song.
Instantly it was there. This time much more defined & human as it entered my mind and I began singing it.
These are the things that tend to convince me of what I've always felt.
Consider, everything that humans produce takes time. There's the planning, re-working, the endless tasks of gathering information and/or material to produce anything. My music is this way. It takes countless hours for me to work out, write down, arrange, record and mix even a single song so that some simple idea in my head can be heard by other people.
But with "inspiration" this is often NOT the case. One second there is nothing there. Then suddenly it exists. No human work proceeds this way.
There are those who think creative work bubbles-up from the unconscious mind, and yes I too believe the subconscious is involved. But even the unconscious needs time to work. These experiences have shown me that there is something more at work here, not bound by the constrictions of time & space. Perhaps something from that realm that gives rise to Creation itself.
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