writing is sacred

For the purposes of this blog, when I use the word sacred, I am using the term in a different way from the norm.  When I use the word sacred, it's not meant to be caught up in any one dogma or religious point of view.  Perhaps explaining what I don't mean when I use the word sacred will help: Writing is not mundane.  It is not every day.  It is special in a way that elevates it beyond shopping lists and jiffy lube invoices.  Writing that is sacred includes both Saint Augustine and Bugs Bunny.  They are both equally sacred.  What turns sacred writing sacred is the receptivity of the author to the inspiration of higher guidance or greater muses at play.

Yesterday I said that I am often called to write against my wishes.  I quipped that the Muse needs me because I have digits and it doesn't.  I wasn't joking all that much. It's not that far from the truth.  Stories come to us more than we come to them.  Fiction, non-fiction, poetry or song lyrics; it's all the same in the eyes of the Muse.  This is why your daily shopping list is rarely inspired by higher forces, but certainly why waking at two o'clock in the morning with a story idea cannot be anything but.  Then there are those times when you are struck by inspiration while writing your shopping list.  The common denominator is the inspirational force.

In ancient times this inspiration was considered the divine source at work.  Divinity was part of the world view of the times.  It was a very different world than today.  My first hurdle was to look divinity in the face.  If I were to go back to the ancient ways of writing and do them any justice, I had to alter my concepts of the divine.  I made the conscious decision not to wear my spirituality on my sleeve however.  What matters most  is that I keep an open channel to the inspiration that comes.

Here, I would encourage anyone to think about this shift in consciousness as a writer.  Explore it with your own mind.  Take the brass scales and weigh it for yourself.