the secret to creative flow is ongoingness

to see life and creative energy with a quality of ongoingness is how I can allow full, unrestricted flow

I think have discovered, in this morning’s meditations and journaling, one magic key to all of life and creation. really, what I discovered is simply a secret to the workings of my own creative process, but I’m going to make a bold claim and say that it can be applied to the larger mechanics and mysteries of life, since life is creative energy manifested, and the personal is the universal.

the secret, like all secrets hidden in plain sight, there to be discovered again and again, is this —

fully embrace the quality of ongoingness in everything — that which is happening now, in the present moment.

what do I mean by ongoingness? I mean that when I truly meditate on the essential nature of things, there is no real, concrete beginning nor end to anything. whether it’s a relationship, travels in a particular place, or something routine, like writing a blog post, sending a newsletter, keeping a journal, taking a photograph.

we think in terms of beginnings and endings because of the way our society has structured us to see life in terms of linear arcs, in terms of units, “tasks,” and a storyline to anticipate, prepare for, predict. but no one can predict the future, and the future never actually comes — it is now, and always now.

our beginnings and endings are artificially imposed to make the story more “neat,” to make sense in the small, linear ways we’ve been conditioned to frame the messiness of life. also belonging to this way of thinking is the idea of overnight success, instant gratification, and emphasis on the public image, on KPIs, GDPS — a near-sighted worship of product over process.

I can go on and on about how this applies philosophically — to a romantic relationship, for instance (this revelation sunk in for me months ago, and was ground shattering in the best possible way, also, I read this book on diaries and ongoingness) — but for the sake of brevity in this post, I want to focus on how “ongoingness” is the key and secret to the creative process.

ongoingness & to the creative process

I came to this realization by asking myself a question — how can I practice full flow in all of my creative expressions?

this lead me to a theory of doors and vessels (which I will write about in a later post) — which is the idea that everything I create is both a door (into a new world) and a vessel (containing worlds).

the state of raw creative expression is a psychic body in flow — or, a flow embodied — such that the body and the flow are inseparable from the other.

so, creating from a place of ongoingness is simply this —

rather than beginning the creative process with a blank page or a blank canvas, recognize that everything you’ve ever wanted to write about, or paint about, is already half written and half painted, within you. when you actually do write it, it is simply giving it form and body, and allowing flow — between you and the page.

if you looked at it from this perspective, you don’t need to “carve out” time to make something. when have you ever carved out time successfully, taken two weeks off work and did everything you’ve always wanted to do? your body won’t be used to it. it’s not full flow; it’s much needed rest.

creative energy has body and form, too. and they don’t begin and end — they are always ongoing.

the distillation

when you force the creative urge to fit inside a task-based mindset — with to-dos lists, a beginning, middle, and end — this linear mindset will restrict flow. you will have to overcome so much inertia to even begin, if you ever make it to beginning at all. how many creative urges wither and die in this phase? almost all. beginning is too hard.

what if we got rid of this beginning-middle-end orientation all together?

instead of channeling your creative expressions into “tasks,” can you see all creative urges as ongoing flow?

creative flow which desires a body — a vessel to hold it?

creative body itself has force, direction, and momentum. see your creativity as an ongoing way of being — your job is to design your life so that you can pay keen attention to what wants to flow from you, and give it space (vessels) and channels (doors) through which it can flow.

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this post ends here, but I’m going to add a concrete footnote example, for further clarity.

my challenge with my creative metabolism is having so much dense things inside of me that never make it out into the real world. this is why I am so bad at posting on social media (and I kind of hate it), and why I never get around to sending newsletters. I have a problem with sharing my work — which is a problem with flow.

why? because I saw “sharing” (flow) as a discrete act separate from creating (body). I have created many good body-vessels for my creative flow, but the flow stops with me, and doesn’t join the world-flow.

except. this blog that you’re reading, which I refer to as my ideas journal. I write and edit directly inside this platform (Squarespace) and I press publish without thinking. creation and sharing / body and flow — happen simultaneously. seen this way, there is no inertia, no blockage — because I approach each post as an ongoing process — not a finished product.

the mindset of ongoingness is my secret to unrestricted, full flow — and a wider mindset of spaciousness, which can acceptance that everything is in flux, and nothing is truly ever “finished,” and that is the beauty of it all.