What is the similarity between creativity and meditation?

Q : As one meditates, one is more in the present moment and new ideas come to the forefront. What is the similarity between creativity and meditation and how do they compliment each-other?

Answer

See, creativity is not a thing about which you plan, it happens. All great artists, poet, painters, dancers, writers even scientists actually cannot and should not claim that they have made this or they have created this. All great things happen to these individuals when they were in a state of sheer relaxation. When I am saying relaxation, it doesn’t mean just a physical relaxation. I’m saying psychological relaxation, emotional relaxation, spiritual relaxation. Archimedes was working on the principles of matter and was so keen and he had spent so much time and energy and he was not reaching even close to conclusions. One day he was bathing. In his bath-tub he was bathing, and when he was bathing, the water has some supernatural, healing, holistic properties. Mind of Archimedes was in a very idle state. He had worked and thought and thought and thought and thought, so hard, nothing was coming up. Mind was exhausted from thinking, tired and when mind tires, your body tires. That’s the reason, he was sitting in the bath, to rejuvenate, to refresh, to kick-off this exhaustion of body and mind. Now his mind was exhausted, his body was exhausted, he is sitting in the bath-tub, scrubbing his body and just lying and when the mind went blank, this is the time when he could really understand what this principle was. It was such a shock to him that he forgot that he is sitting in a bath, he just yell out “Eureka” and ran out of his bathroom to the streets and people were seeing a naked man who is as such very intelligent person, everyone knew he is a very intelligent, a scholar, a researcher and here he is walking naked, stark naked in the streets and yelling out “Eureka, I’ve found, I’ve found, I’ve found”. All great revolutions have happened to those people when they were in the state of meditativeness. Now they might not have learned the techniques; see these-these days everything is a techno-techno thing, so even for meditation there is a technique. So these people never learned the technique, they were not using some precise procedure, they were not following some tips, but this state happened to them. And this was the state where the supra sub-conscious mind which is part of the macro-cosmic mind, started functioning and this great, great things dawned upon.

Tagore, the noble prize winner from India. When he was asked how and what did he do to write “Gitanjali”. Tagore gave a very beautiful answer. He said I never wrote Gitanjali, it got written through me. I am not the writer, I am the one who received it.

In any field say science to art, any field to philosophy, one tends to put all his energy in understanding the riddle and the puzzle, understanding the theory and working on it and thinking and thinking and thinking and nothing coming up, the time comes when the thinking stops and when the thinking stops, real knowledge is received.

Why meditation is important, for this very reason, that it helps you to reach that stage, where you don’t have to make any extra efforts but where you are in such a wavelength that the knowledge begins to open up all of its charms to you. So I would say every creative person is a meditator, even if that person is not doing traditionally meditations; but what is meditation, it’s a state of mind where thoughts are not clattering, you are not being bombarded with your memories of past life time where you are not wasting your time in speculations, about your uncertain future.

Meditation is when you are in a state where mind is quiet but you are not sleeping and you are fully awake, very vigilant, and very agile, the level of the awareness is high and this is the time where all inventions happen.

So I would say every scientist comes close to that moment, very close to that moment where a Yogi is, but he will not be enjoying that state because he was not looking for that. So whatever problem or whatever subject, he or she was focused upon, they are thinking on those lines, mind gets exhausted, mind is still, revelation happened, and they come back to their normal stage of their mind. So they go very close to that door, that they would have opened the door, the whole spiritual world would had sprung up in front of them. But they just come back from those doors and these doors remain closed for them. But for a Mystic, these doors open-up.

So I believe every meditator is definitely a creator because he or she is creating the higher levels of consciousness within, and with this higher level of consciousness all beautiful things will happen.

But again the capacity to receive this, which will be showered, is missing in many people, it’s there for everyone, but we are not prepared for this. Because our all energies are being wasted in the false pursuits, how good I am looking, how much money I have, how many club memberships I have, for all these fickle things your energies are going wasted. Thus, you might be a billionaire but still a stupid and you might be a pauper but a great meditator and a great creator.

Although I would still like to add upon, the perfect balance of meditation, perfect. Meditations will give you the creativity and intelligence both together. If you are a studious person and you are doing all your studies in your respective fields, you end up having those degrees and then end up having those good posts which will pay you well and you will get all the recognition and respect but what about your consciousness! You are not giving a chance to yourself to evolve consciously. So you might be at the top most place, but still you are at a lowest rung.

When we bring up the subject of consciousness, you might be a successful painter and your paintings are being sold for millions of rupees and dollars, not rupees, dollars, but yet your mind is still hungry for more fame and more recognition and more awards and is frustrated when someone says “no this painting is not good”, or when some juvenile painter says “oh even I can do that”, and that hurts the ego so much. So if you are carrying a big ego in you, you are not an intelligent person.

Intelligence and creativity both should be the integral part of your life and both of these things should be in harmony and these both of the things can be brought by “meditativeness”, I am not saying meditation, meditativeness.

Gurumaa

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Tags: creativity, healing, macro-cosmic mind, meditation