Art From Above

The other day at work an artist came in to drop off some of his paintings and he proceeded to tell us that God gives him visions of what to paint. Usually when people say things like this I smile politely and turn quickly away to give a good eye roll towards the wall. To make matters worse, this guy wasn't even a good artist—The least God could do is pick a better artist to paint for him, I thought. But the fact that this man wasn't good actually helped clear something up for me (no, I wasn't converted), but for the first time I was able to make sense of what he was saying.

When this man feels inspired or when he gets a clear idea of what to paint he believes this comes from God. I can actually relate to that because as a writer I have had similar moments, I've just never given a thumbs up towards heaven when they've happened because I don't believe that's where they came from. I have had moments writing poems when I have no idea what I'm saying or where the poem is headed until it suddenly, and seemingly at once, becomes very clear and the rest flows easily from my head and from my heart. See, I just said it comes from my head and my heart—others would say it comes from God. It's just a matter of what you do or don't believe in.

So, I stopped mid eye roll this time because I realized that while I would personally be freaked out if I thought someone (God included) was infiltrating my mind with "visions," all creative minds have moments of inspiration from somewhere...whether we choose to believe it comes from within us, around us, or even above us.