Staying
Safe or Surrendering:
A Dilemma of Creativity and Spirituality
Rahima
Warren
Many
years ago, I had an awe-inspiring glimpse of the Flow of Divine
Creativity. It appeared to me as a cosmic Fountain of Creativity,
endlessly flowing upward with an outrageous infinitude of vivid,
colorful images: trees, cartoons, volcanoes, tulips, cars, babies,
tigers, paintings, skyscrapers, movies, soldiers, roses, stars,
drums—everything tumbling upward forever!
I
saw that what we human creators do is tap into this infinite
Fountain, and channel one little stream into manifestation, whether
we are a musician or a parent, an architect or a writer, an artist or
an engineer. Certainly this is my experience of writing my visionary
trilogy, The Star-Seer’s Prophecy. A certain dream
character had been haunting me for years. One day, I wrote a short
story in my journal about this character, hoping the little story
would make him stop bothering me. Ha!
I’d
tapped into that Fountain and now the Flow was sweeping me away! I
could have fought it and tried to get back to my life and my career
as a psychotherapist. However, my spiritual path is a path of
surrender. Our ego-minds are all about keeping control and staying
safe, so any ego-effort to understand or get close to the Divine is
doomed to failure. Only by surrendering that ego-control can we open
ourselves to the Divine, and to our creativity (which are aspects of
the same Flow.)
The
Divine (however you name it) is not concerned with our staying safe
and small, but with our blooming into our full, beautiful, creative
selves. If I had ignored this flood of creative inspiration that I
had tapped into, I would have stayed in my safe rut, and never
discovered the wonders of allowing my creativity full rein (or in my
case, reign!), or faced the “growth opportunity” of offering my
book to the world. Instead, I surrendered to the passionate
outpouring of this character’s story, whose name turned out to be
Kyr. With no idea where his story was going, no outline, no plan, I
just wrote whatever came through, no matter how dark or brilliant.
Kyr’s
path is also one of surrender. At first, he has no choice but submit,
since he has been born and raised as a slave of the Soul-Drinker, an
evil sorcerer-king with vast powers that no one can combat. Then he
is rescued and faces a choice: cling to his deathly loyalty to his
master, or to take the unknown hard path toward life, love and the
Light.
Kyr’s
journey toward the Light is a journey of surrender. At each step of
the way, he has to surrender his old view of who he is and what he
deserves, and open more and more to his true nature. I suspect that
may be true for all of us, but it is rarely easy. The ego-mind wants
to stay with what it knows, no matter how awful, and to stay small,
with the illusion that this makes us safe. In Dark Innocence:
Book One of my trilogy, there is a scene where Kyr surrenders
his pain and remorse to the Goddess. After all these years of
rewriting, editing, publishing and now doing my best to let the world
know about Kyr’s dark, intense, yet healing and inspiring story,
that scene still touches my heart.
Contemplation
Questions
Have
you experienced that dilemma between safety and surrender?
Does
surrender play a role in your spirituality and/or creativity?
Have
you been “haunted” by an inner character in your dreams or
imagination? How have you dealt with him/her? Have you tried letting
them tell you their story?
I’d
love to hear your answers! Please leave a comment, if you are so
inspired.
Tour Notes
This
week you can grab the first book in the Star-Seer’s Prophecy
Trilogy for just 99 cents. That’s right Dark
Innocence is
marked way, way down, giving you the chance to explore this
thought-provoking fantasy series for yourself. Get your copy
at Amazon, Barnes
& Noble,
or iBookstoday!
Oh,
and don’t forget to enter our giveaway for your chance to win an
autographed copy of Fierce
Blessings or
a Star-Seer’s Prophecy t-shirt. We have a total of 4 prizes for 4
lucky winners, hooray! Enter the giveaway right
here: www.novelpublicity.com/dark-innocence
About Dark
Innocence:
In an ancient world of blood sorcery and healing magic, the
Soul-Drinker, a vicious necromancer-king, is draining the life from
the souls of the people and of the earth itself. Worse yet, he has
banished the land's rightful Goddess, and disrupted the Sacred
Balance, sending the mortal and divine realms whirling toward
destruction.
The only hope for salvation is a youth named Kyr, born and raised as one of the Soul-Drinker's blindly obedient slaves. Kyr knows only the pain, evil and cruelty of the Soul-Drinker's hell--and nothing of the Star-Seer's Prophecy that declares him to be the long-sought Liberator.
Rescued by strangers, Kyr embarks on a bewildering journey into a bizarre new life, where kindness and love are real. If he is to fulfill his destiny, he must battle his inner demons and fight to find his buried capacities for compassion and courage. Will he be able to surrender the inner ice that has been his soul's only protection in time to save the world from disaster?
The only hope for salvation is a youth named Kyr, born and raised as one of the Soul-Drinker's blindly obedient slaves. Kyr knows only the pain, evil and cruelty of the Soul-Drinker's hell--and nothing of the Star-Seer's Prophecy that declares him to be the long-sought Liberator.
Rescued by strangers, Kyr embarks on a bewildering journey into a bizarre new life, where kindness and love are real. If he is to fulfill his destiny, he must battle his inner demons and fight to find his buried capacities for compassion and courage. Will he be able to surrender the inner ice that has been his soul's only protection in time to save the world from disaster?
Again,
you can grab your copy for just 99 cents at Amazon, Barnes
& Noble,
or iBooks as
part of this special event!
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