Creating Intro
Gregg’s Reflection
When I encounter an atheist, this is how I describe God: I think every created thing, every song ever written, every painting, every building, every idea, comes from tapping into a flow of energy from another dimension. (And I haven’t found anyone disagreeing.) John Lennon said he never wrote a song, he just tapped into the source. As a Christian, I call that energy Grace, and the source God. Living School faculty Cynthia Bourgeault says,
We are downloading the eternal into the now. There is tremendous exchange between the realms.
In the ‘90’s, my brother Travis and I studied Peter Senge’s The Fifth Discipline, and went about turning our business into a learning organization using Senge’s work as a road map. I encountered my mentor Dr Charlotte Roberts, one of Senge’s partners at Innovation Associates, when we brought her down to teach Leadership and Personal Mastery to our team.
Charlotte has remained a mentor to me to this day. As I said in my post on Setting Intentions, She defines Personal Mastery in this way:
Personal mastery is the discipline of employment and engagement of self to create desired results in a consistent fashion. What do we mean by employment? Employment means I literally take action. However, I can employ myself in my work and not be engaged. Engagement means I bring my passion, my energy, and my full self to the work.
The tool of Personal Mastery is the tension chart. We used this tool to build our business through three rounds of visioning, and I created my second career and calling using this tool.
Senge credited Robert Fritz with developing the discipline of Personal Mastery. After selling the business, I studied with Fritz three years, getting certified as a Structural Organizational Consultant. In Your Life as Art, Fritz tells us:
Building and maintaining structural tension in our lives takes two skills: Envisioning the results you want, and evaluating your current reality objectively. Structural tension is a way of life.
Orientation is a way of describing where you spend most of your time...Structural tension is not only a technique, but also a way of life that is deeply integrated within. It is internalized and assimilated into the consciousness. The more deeply internalized, the more you are able to negotiate the currents….As you begin to internalize structural tension, the mechanics and orientation feed each other as you move towards mastering your creative process.
As you internalize the vision and the current reality, structural tension becomes a more powerful dynamic force. Your actions become more motivated, and you become more inventive about your process. It seems as if your whole being is aligned and working together on behalf of the full manifestation of the vision.
Fritz speaks about the mystical dimension to internalizing structural tension. He tells us,
Coincidences begin to occur regularly….Things begin to fall into place as if the universe were on your side, helping to move you toward your goals...No matter how skeptical you may be, it will happen anyway...When structural tension is internalized, strange and wonderful things can happen that help you create your vision.
As you wade deeper into creating, another wonderful idea I learned from Charlotte Roberts was ‘What wants to happen?’ I recently asked Charlotte to expand on this idea which I have used hundreds of times in my coaching and consulting. She said:
It comes from Meg Wheatley as a way to get folks to think about living systems. Because they’re alive, living systems are in constant change and chaos with strange attractors that redirect intention and attention. Living systems oscillate between chaos and order. So to plan the future of your org or family, you have to look out in the environment and inside human consciousness to see trends of what is trying to emerge. Our conversation about hate that is all over the planet — what wants to happen? Another world war? The fight against evil? Avoiding being personally responsible by having a “Strong” leader?
A key piece of structural work is learning to see reality clearly. I find that has been a tremendous help in my spiritual journey, as contemplation gave me ‘eyes to see’ more deeply into reality, and to realize the distortions in which I had been living. If you misdiagnose reality, you will be very unlikely to reach the vision you seek.
Come along on a journey into Creating, from Scripture, the saints and mystics, to the modern ideas of Rick Rubin and Robert Fritz. Blessings. Don’t miss the full post on Creating here.
Journaling Prompts
How would life change if you began to set a clear vision of a desired future, and took an unflinching look at the reality vis a vis that vision? How do you keep from falling into a victim mentality, where all power is in the circumstances, and you are powerless to create change? What do you desire to create in your life over the next season?
Scripture
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, “Let there be light”, and their was light.
Genesis 1:1-2
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come. The old has gone, the new is here!
2 Corinthians 5:17
For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10
For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.
Hebrews 3:4
Ancient Writings
I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free. Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.
Michelangelo, who felt the sculptor's job is to reveal the statue that is already present in the stone. Michelangelo's most famous sculpture is David, which was carved from marble that his contemporaries considered to be "unworkable".
The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. Whatever you think you can do, or believe you can do, begin it. Action has magic, power and grace.
Modern Writings
Creation is thus God's presence in creatures. The Greek Orthodox theologian Philip Sherrard has written that "Creation is nothing less than the manifestation of God's hidden Being."
Wendell Berry, Christianity and the Survival of Creation, pg. 308.
The genius of a composer is found in the notes of his music; but analyzing the notes will not reveal his genius. The poet's greatness is contained in his words; yet the study of his words will not disclose his inspiration. God reveals himself in creation; but scrutinize creation as minutely as you wish, you will not find God, any more than you will find the soul through careful examination of your body.”
Anthony de Mello, Awakening: Conversations with the Masters
True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, Aviator
Creation is a process that is still happening and we’re in on it! We are a part of this endless creativity of God.
Richard Rohr
We are downloading the eternal into the now. There is tremendous exchange between the realms.
Cynthia Bourgeault, Living School Teaching
I’ve come to appreciate that one of the gifts of artists is the ability to see the world as it really is.
Peter Senge, Introduction to Synchronicity by Jaworski
The psyche has admittance to a universal wisdom deeper than what we can come up with in our conscious mind. It provides a far less limited view. An oceanic source.
We don't know how it works and we don't know why it works, yet many artists tap into something beyond themselves without recognizing the process at play, purely through accessing the subconscious.
Isolated places like a forest, a monastery, or a sailboat in the middle of the ocean are fine locations to receive direct transmissions from the universe.
If instead you want to tune in to the collective consciousness, you might sit in a busy spot with people coming and going and experience Source as filtered through humanity. This secondhand approach is no less valid.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, p. 64, 69
Our thoughts, feelings, processes, and unconscious beliefs have an energy that is hidden in the work. This unseen, unmeasurable force gives each piece its magnetism. A completed project is only made up of our intention and our experiments around it. Remove intention and all that's left is the ornamental shell.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, p. 94
Our work embodies a higher purpose. Whether we know it or not, we're a conduit for the universe. Material is allowed through us. If we are a clear channel, our intention reflects the intention of the cosmos.
Most creators think of themselves as the conductor of the orchestra. If we zoom out of our small view of reality, we function more as an instrumentalist in a much larger symphony the universe is orchestrating.
Rick Rubin, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, p. 95
In the full Creating Post, I summarize the first chapters of Robert Fritz’s book, Your Life as Art, referenced in my reflection. To give you a taste, here is a visioning exercise. Most visioning has to do with our external life. This one looks inside:
Internal/External Exercise
Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and relax.
Imagine that you have created many of your major goals, and imagine how you will experience life at that point. Use this thought experiment to define the inner experience you want to create.
Get a clear sense of your desired end result on the level of your inner experience.
Focus on that experience. You may have a picture and a feeling tone, and a sense of the internal state that you want, whether it's visual or experiential. The main focus here is that you know what type of internal experience you would like to create.
Focus on your current internal experience in your life and begin to create structural tension between the desired state and your current state. Hold that structural tension for a few moments and as you do, realize that you are turning this over to your mind. You are giving your mind the job of producing this internal state in your life, no matter what the outward circumstances.
Hold that tension for a few moments more (10 seconds).
Take a deep breath, relax your focus, and when you're ready, open your
eyes.
The Inner Sketch
While we have both an internal and an external life, our internal life is the far more important of the two. One can have wonderful surroundings, an affluent life style, good career opportunities, and other wonderful things in life, and still suffer insecurity, depression, lethargy, and hopelessness. On the other hand, one might not enjoy any of the benefits of a good material life, and still have peace of mind, involvement with life, and a sense of hope. External and internal conditions are independent from each other. And while we would want favorable conditions for both, let's understand that the internal counts more heavily than does the external in our overall experience of life.
How do you want your life to be far into the future from an internal perspective? What will be important to you? As you begin to form a picture of your future self, here are some things to consider: Your state of being, your level of interest in what you may be doing, the love you have in your life, your involvement with others, the way you spend your time, your health, your sense of direction, your relationship with yourself, your relationship with your circle of friends and community. You might consider other factors of your internal life, such as your sense of spiritual fulfillment, your sense of commitment to your deepest values, your sense of direction, and your sense of place.