Guest Post by Whitney Ferré

January 25th, 2012

“The Creativity PORTAL”

By Whitney Ferré of Creatively Fit

What if the true intention behind your creative practice was to be a PORTAL for change on this planet? Would this be NEW to you?

For me, the most exciting part of my creative journey has been the corresponding emotional and spiritual journey. I have inspired “non-artists” to embrace their creative power since 1996, but I confess that I did not do so in order that they might create “quality” art or marketable product. What has always inspired excited energy within me and a passionate drive to share paints, colored pencils and watercolors with as many people as possible is my belief that it is our creative energy that is going to save the world—literally! As the world prepared for 2012 I was further inspired as some of my most respected spiritual philosophers and leaders started sharing their own beliefs surrounding our creative spirits. This following quote is from Andrew Cohen.

“In the way that I use the term, God is the energy and intelligence that created the universe and is driving the process forward in every moment. And that energy and intelligence cares desperately about change and innovation and the release of potentials that have not existed before. So it is constantly looking for portals through which it can enter into the world and consciously engage with creating its next step. As conscious human beings who have been blessed with self-awareness and free agency, we are those portals.” ~Andrew Cohen

Can you go there? Can you imagine the infinite universe scanning kitchen tables and art studios around the globe, searching for PORTALS through which to channel its infinite, creative energy? Why not? As human beings we created art before we created a monetary system OR a written language. We can look at tribal art and we know the sculptures, paintings, and symbols were created to access other dimensions and powers. We can still do that today.

The image below hangs above the door to my art studio. The “double croc” is an ancient symbol of protection. My painting it was a meditation on protecting the good, positive energy and my own “inner croc” that needed a boost to “own my power” and protect my own inner landscape. (Read more in my blog post here….)

This Creative Goddess is my most recent painting, still in process, and has already provided hours of colorful, sparkly meditations on all that is possible. As I layered and layered the colors, scratched through to bottom layers, and made her glow with my white & yellow painted fingers, I felt as though I was really accessing this goddess, encouraging me to think bigger, to expand my awareness about my own creative power and really let go!

I do believe it will be when more people proudly state, “I am creative!” rather than, “I can’t even draw a straight line…” that our global consciousness will shift and our world will step into a new time of greater peace, compassion and sustainability. YOU getting “Creative Everyday” is building that energy that our world needs. Here is what Ken Wilber has to say about creativity….

“Creativity: in some ways it seems so common, yet in other ways it is actually at the foundation of virtually every important activity and practice in human life—from relationships to play, from work to relaxation, from meditation to transformative practice, from parenting to teaching, from emotional expression to cognitive competence, from recreation to career choice. In many ways, creativity has been thought of as a rare, difficult, hard-to-come-by talent or gift, evidenced only by the few geniuses of each era. But according to the Integral view, creativity is actually a component of each and every moment of existence, and it can be learned and exercised with a few simple practices.” ~Ken Wilber

This is why there is such power in what Leah is doing here at Creative Every Day. Each day that you flex your creative muscles you are opening up as a portal to infinite creativity.

Here is a really fun & easy exercise to create and, should you choose, integrate into your spiritual life. I call them Story Cards.

Grab that stack of magazines and tear out ANY images that catch your attention. If anything, a color, a texture, an image, makes you go, “Oooooh!” tear it out. Don’t judge and don’t wonder what you are going to do with it. Just grab the pages that speak to you.

When you have a nice stack of images, divide them into 3 piles (you can make many sets of these, but each time make 3 piles). How do you divide them? Just let the images that you intuitively feel should be together join the same pile. You do not even have to label them yet, or understand the difference between the piles. One pile may have all bluer images, another pile nature images. The image above is a collage of three of my Story Cards. The far left card is about my spiritual life. When I look back on that card, with the fact that right now I am busy with our new SPIRIT Project 2012, I get the chills! The middle card was all about things I love. The far left card was inspired by nature.

When you are done, you will have exercised your “creative intuitive” muscle and have cards you can go to over and over for insight into the ART that is your LIFE!

I hope this NEW perspective on your daily creative activity inspires some new thoughts and energy into your practice. Namaste. Whitney

Whitney is the author of The Artist Within, A Guide to Becoming Creatively Fit and you can learn more about Whitney at www.CreativelyFit.com and join the SPIRIT Project for only $20.12 for the entire year!

9 Responses

I am so going to make the story cards! Thank you for the inspirational post. It definitely got me excited about experimenting with a different approach to my artwork.

Whitney- very inspiring blog. will try the story cards. I was going to make a big collage but the like the idea of 3 piles and 3 different visions. it is good to see you talk about how before the word there was art. I am always reminding people of that – art held our history for centuries. elizabeth

there was a time when creativity was truly about being creative, and everyone had access to it – almost everyone played the piano or knit or even made their own barns – people were CREATIVE. And also there was this expectation absent that you HAD to be some sort of master at it, that the end purpose of CREATIVITY was to become some sort of celebrity. This attitude pervades today and tends to taint true creativity. When was the last time anyone got together with a guitar to just sing songs? No expectation of being perfectly in tune or sounding like (pop star du jour insert here)? I love writings like this one and blogs like this in general for that reason. It’s time we truly valued creativity and community for what it was.

The Creative Godess painting truly glows with light..thank you for sharing this website and the Story Card exercise. I have been thinking about making some kind of cards – this is the extra boost I needed :) !

Oh! I’ll be there with bells on. The Spirit Project sounds right up my alley.

Wonderful, inspiring post. Thank you!

I’ve been wanting to make my own story cards for ages (though I didn’t know that was what they were going to be called!), but I didn’t know where to start. I love this intuitive exercise — I will try it! Thanks, Whitney.

This is fabulous! Inspiring and energizing! Just what I need. Nice to “meet” you here – I’ve heard about your work w/Creatively Fit. thank you

[...] to link up my post, I found this wonderful post speaking of a different version of this activity: Story Cards. Head over for more insights! What creative activities do you share with your children that you [...]

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