Creativity Friday: 4 am epiphanies

I’ve been back from vacation in California for just over two weeks. You’d think by now that I’d be back into the swing of things, but I really don’t feel this way. I’m still scrambling to catch up on everything on my ever-growing “To Do” list. (Which begs the question: Does anyone have a never-growing “To Do” list? Is this even possible? Hmmm.)

Part of what’s affected me is my hand, which is better than it was last week, but still not at 100%. Repetitive stress injuries sometimes seem to take as long to heal as they did to create. So, while I’ve been in the studio, I’m trying to vary what I do: several hours of work, several hours of research reading. Frankly, I’ve learned this the hard way: Throughout my career as an artist, I’ve had periods where I’ve been unable to work because of repetitive stress injuries. The worst was right after I finished the first edition of The Book of Goddesses in 1995—I had pushed myself so hard to meet that deadline that I worked through a painful repetitive stress injury. Afterward, I was unable to paint for six months, and ended up having extensive physical therapy on my shoulders and arms. The upside was that, as a consequence, I began to focus on my writing—I could type, even if I couldn’t hold a paintbrush or pencil for too long.

Being physically out-of-sorts has affected my ability to plow through tasks as quickly as possible. But this forced slowing down has opened my eyes to other possibilities that I hadn’t noticed before for my work—possibilities that probably fall under the category of 4 am epiphanies.

“What’s a 4 am epiphany?” you might be wondering. They’re those moments when you wake up in the middle of the night from a sound sleep with sudden clarity. For some reason, they always seem to happen to me at 4 am; usually I’m unable to get back to sleep, because of the energy which these sudden realizations bring. I’m too excited and my mind is going at 100 miles a minute.

These epiphanies differ from inspiration strikes from the Muses; they’re usually more about bigger life issues, though they may lead to intense creativity. I think of them as being closer to what Julia Cameron calls “marching orders”; where we are revealed what our next step in our journey should be.

As for my latest epiphanies, Let’s just say that I’m being pushed toward a direction that I’m eager to go but have been afraid to do so. It’s terrifyingly intimidating, from a creative and business standpoint, though I am doing my best to marshall my resources. One reassurance: Once I had this epiphany, suddenly it seemed as though all sorts of helpful affirmations appeared where there were none before. Coincidence?

It’s too soon for me to detail what lies before me in specifics. Let’s say that the course I’ll be taking feels very organic, and will force me to grow as an artist and writer. If everything develops as I hope, it will be very exciting! And, of course, I’ll be sharing more information here when the time is right.

And how about you? What are your 4 am epiphanies?

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