Creativity: "a queer divine dissatisfaction"

I have been a much happier person since the day I shifted my view of creativity from being something I need to struggle to make happen, to understanding that it is something I need to surrender to. It is a force that I believe exists inside everyone, that is hammered out of us by (1) school systems that find it easier (for teachers) to have all the children doing the same exact work in conformed units of study, (2) by a society that is threatened by free thinking and creative expression, and (3) by a learned obsession with judging the work of ourselves and others according to established, artificial criteria imposed by whatever era and culture we live in.


In browsing around for material on "Week 5: Synthesizing and Refining Creativity" for the CMC11 MOOC, I found this story in which Martha Graham shares her philosophy with Agnes de Mille. Graham sees creative work as something that cannot and should not be judged, weighed and measured, and she speaks to the need to be open and to pursue "the urges that motivate you."


In 1943 Agnes de Mille was sipping sodas together with Martha Graham in a New York restaurant after the opening of Oklahoma, which met with "flamboyant success" that de Mille had not expected to receive. She thought about her prior works that she herself considered to be finer examples of her art, but which had gone neglected by critics and the public. In her 1991 book Martha: "The Life and Work of Martha Graham," she recorded the exchange with Graham:

I confessed that I had a burning desire to be excellent, but no faith that I could be.

Martha said to me, very quietly:

'There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep yourself open and aware to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open. ... No artist is pleased. [There is] no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a queer divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.'

CMC11