In which I reflect on the terribly English obsession of getting too big for your boots and other cultural idioms, like being brought down a peg or two.
This week I got to speak to a real hero of mine.
Julia Cameron.
Author of The Artist’s Way.
The opportunity caught me off guard and completely unprepared. Perhaps I hadn’t thought her actually human or available to speak to such mere mortals as myself. And all of a sudden, there I was, on a teleconference call, being asked by the convener if anyone had any questions for Julia.
Surprised by the deathly hush that ensued, I knew I had to take the plunge – or waste the chance for good.
If I’d really thought ahead, I could have done much better. Asked her what she thought about the dilemma of mums like myself, who work til late at night, and barely manage to pull themselves out of bed before the kids get up, to write their Morning Pages. Or struggle to find someone to babysit for their weekly Artist Date. How you manage the eternal, nagging guilt of having to choose between your role as Mum and your commitment to your Inner Artist (who Cameron explains is also a child, and therefore another little being we need to nurture)?
And I’m desperately curious to know if she has any children herself. Did she ever face these choices and dilemmas in her life?
I didn’t ask those things. I asked about my own difficulty with keeping up the Morning Pages, in the highs and lows of creative life. She reiterated the importance of balancing Morning Pages with your weekly Artist Date. Reminded me to keep on replenishing my Inner Well.
It was nothing that I didn’t really know, from working through the book with On The Wing, but I think hearing it from the mouth of authority herself will have a bigger impact on me. That’s what the influence of a hero will do, right?
This week I’ve been thinking a lot about the influence of others on our path to success.
There are some people in my life who, simply by their very presence, their being-ness, seem to inspire me to pursue my dreams more avidly. One friend in particular, since January, has been a great champion of my blog. We see each other regularly, and have always had plenty of other interests in common to discuss, but a great deal of the time we focus on talking about my writing.
Now, my British sensibility often kicks in and feels a bit uncomfortable with this. “Ooo, hark at you, girl, revelling in the spotlight of your own creation.” And last week I joked that it sometimes feels like I’m the celebrity of my own soap-opera life. It’s that creeping sense that something will happen soon to bring me down a peg or two. A terribly English obsession.
But no! Stop! My Inner Artist doesn’t agree. She’s fighting to be heard and seen, and throwing off the trappings of repression and abuse from all these years of being forced to fit into the mould of Being Nice and Normal. What Cameron calls The Virtue Trap. And it’s a sticky one.
Is it so awful for me to enjoy talking about my dreams and my writing (the two being intricately intertwined) with someone that appreciates my art?
Just as I was thinking this quietly to myself, Cameron popped in with a wonderful comment about the value of having people that are Muses in your life.
A Muse is someone that inspires you to achieve, to work harder on your dreams.
A Muse can give you focus, make you feel more energized about your work. From time to time, as artists, writers and creative types, we all need this. Actually, I’d go so far as to say that as creative types, we need it regularly. Sure we’re inner-focused and self-directed, but we plunder the depths of that well so frequently that we need much support and inspiration to keep it filling up.
Looking back over my life, I see that many people have fulfilled this function of Muse to me. And that perhaps I have also served that role for them. Because it looks a lot to me like the Muse relationship is a two-way thing. Once upon a time, Artists had Patrons that supported their work, who then became the beneficiaries of the artistic output.
In the 21st Century, I think we’re far more likely to have “creative partnerships” that support our artistic and personal development. People that we riff with about our thoughts and ideas, people that we sing our souls to, who will listen and applaud, or quietly hold us in the darkness while we cry. There is a love we share, in these relationships, that feels more subtle and more precious than the humdrum workings of everyday life.
Friends can become Believing Mirrors.
As the call with Julia drew to a close, she made one last wonderful point about the value of friends that can support you in your dreams. She described how some friends become Believing Mirrors to us. These are friends who can connect to our dreams, and reflect back to us our true potential, our true possibility, and our true size.
Our own self-made mirrors can be of terribly poor quality, or may have become warped through years of repression, powerful fears, and the naysaying of our vicious Inner Critic. How can we trust that we’re looking at an adequate reflection of ourselves? Or even something that portrays a halfway decent likeness of who we really are? I don’t think we can.
If you have a friend who is a Believing Mirror of your true beauty, talent and ability, you are truly truly blessed in your desire for growth. How ridiculous, then, to discard their offerings as merely ego-seeking-grandiosity and wanton self-indulgence?
Cameron said that when you get stuck, in Fear (that dirty F-word again), in rabbit-in-the-headlights paralysis, in hugely debilitating self-doubt and destruction, turn to that friend and ask them just to pray for you. You will be amazed at the power of this pure and simple act.
If I know you, may I be a Believing Mirror to you.
My door is open. Come and tell me what you think.
The Teleseminar with Julia Cameron was held by Julia McCutchen, and you can read more about it on Ms McCutchen’s blog
Julia McCutchen is the author of the following book:
The Writer’s Journey: How to Prepare Your Non-Fiction Writing for Professional Presentation to Agents and Publishers: From Inspiration to Publication
This is a fabulously useful and insightful book that I heartily recommend to all writers still aspiring to be published in the old-fashioned way. You know, on paper.
