Blessings of Creativity

This past week-end I had the joy and blessing to participate in our guild's retreat in wine country. It was held at the gorgeous convent there. As our president said, the food was like cruise food. The scenery was inspiring.

The part most wonderful to me was 3 days of sewing, talking, sharing, creating with 26 fabulous friends and being in the experience far away from television and the day's news. It was a restoring and refreshing break.

Photo of the center of my quilt I made at the retreat. I finished the top at the retreat and am ready to quilt it today. I'll put the finished quilt up in a day or so.

Once again I melted into the creative process and felt the energy of something greater than I. For me, creativity is a spiritual experience. I feel led by a loving energy to write words or pick fabrics or configure some new creation. Quilting is one of my creative expressions and it means so much to me that is beyond the actual end product. The process itself is a spiritual one. I think because we are made in the image of God, it is our nature to create, and when we don't, something is not quite right in our lives. Some say that depression is the energy of one's life force turning inward rather than expressing in creative ways. In fact I have seen the turn around in people's lives when they commence to unleash their natural creative energies.

I wonder what might happen if people gave themselves a creation break each day? Say a half an hour or an hour a day. I wonder if depression might fade, addictions might fall away, and joy might come to stay.