Carl Jung was writing to his friend about “The Red Book,” a record of his mystical journeying. He mentioned that its contents would be viewed as pure madness if they were not contained within an appropriate worldview that could make sense of it. The book had to have a dogmatic quality to it, as he worked within the sphere of clinical psychology. Otherwise, it would be incomprehensible – pure dithering.

Jung’s observation dovetails with the notion that all creative expression must be a dialogue between the rational and intuitive sides of the mind. It is a constant dance, with one side taking the lead for a moment and then relinquishing control to the other.

Elsewhere Jung wrote that the unconscious speaks with a thousand voices. Primordial sensations, whether visual or auditory, even tactile, may fly forth. There may be pure joy in reveling in them. But they do not add up to something that can be communicated to another person, the recipient of the creative product. All that inspiration needs a frame, some sort of tradition, in order to be capable of transmission.

One really good exercise is to begin to view your creative endeavor as a response to a specific work by another artist. Enter directly into a conversation with another artist via their process. The 20th-century painter Francis Bacon, for example, was obsessed with Diego Velazquez’s portrait of Pope Innocent X, completed in 1650. He used his own portraiture to engage with the long-dead Velazquez in a direct fashion. Bacon’s florid brushstrokes in his corresponding portraits may not have had the same resonance if they were produced without this reference. He needed to strike up a conversation with a painter from the 17th century in order to find a place for his craft.

Which artist do you want to have a conversation with? Which work of art speaks to you, and how can you intuit a way to enter into dialogue with it? These questions allow you to see your own creative endeavor as part of a tradition. This approach can be quite liberating, for it frees up the mind. All your sparks of inspiration now have some place to land.

Photo by RhondaK Native Florida Folk Artist on Unsplash