Shadow

The Muse then is that most terrified of all the virgins. She starts if she hears a sound, pales if you ask her questions, spins and vanishes if you disturb her dress. We might start off by paraphrasing Oscar Wilde’s poem, substituting the world “Art” for “Love.”
Art will fly if held too lightly.
Art will die if held too tightly.
Lightly, tightly, how do I know?
Whether I holding or letting Art go?”

–Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing/Essays on Creativity

Beckoning and befriending The Muse takes work and energy. The focus required to summon The Muse asks that we turn inward. Looking at one’s own self consolidates awareness of our motives, those conscious and unconscious, what drives us to move through and impress ourselves upon the world in a unique manner that distinguishes us and expresses our personality.

The impetus to create involves two simultaneous processes, one of bringing the formless into form, making something out of the rawness of nothing. And then there is transformation under which each artist goes when carving and crafting our creating.

The Muse oversees and directs these two aspects of making while being remade, molding while being reshaped.