I’ve noticed that when love dies, so does the muse. And love can die in so many ways.
I’m not talking about whether or not you have a relationship. Love can flourish in a relationship, but you can also be in a relationship in which love is broken. Love can also flourish when you are by yourself, but you can also fall hopelessly into a dark and lonely tunnel of isolation. The muse’s wings seem to be made of love.
In her book The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron talks about the toxicity of a crazymaker to the artistic soul. Some people marry a crazymaker, others have them as parents, siblings, or even artistic friends. I had my share… I can vouch for the toxicity to one’s creativity.
Now, to be fair, relationships always have two sides, and when crazymaking enters the picture, there’s a certain amount of if that belongs to both people. In her effort to protect the creative soul, Cameron focuses on the toxicity that is hurled upon the receiver. Crazymakers break deals, destroy schedules, expect special treatment, discount your reality, spend your time and money for you, blame, create drama, and hate order, among other things. In a word, they are profoundly narcissistic. Not only does their world revolve around them, but they make everyone else’s world revolve around them as well—especially those who loved them before they became crazymakers. They leverage love to get what they want.
Usually, the would-be creative person participates in the craziness. You can’t project it all. Why did I accept the nuttiness of my crazymakers? Because something inside me just didn’t believe in the muse. It was far easier to pretend to love and avoid the muse than it was to insist on the health of my muse and challenge the love that wasn’t actually there. It was easier to be a prisoner of the crazymaker than it was to engage my inner artist. That’s how the creative soul dies.
The crazymaker is particularly toxic for two reasons. First, the crazymaker leverages the relationship and in so doing kills any hint of real love. Love turns into neediness and codependency. Manipulation rules. One’s creativity gets sucked up into the manipulation spiral that is necessitated in the survival of a crazymaker relationship. Love dies, and creativity disappears.
But also, the crazymaker sends you into that dark and lonely tunnel of isolation from yourself. Codependency does that. You enter toxic isolation and lose track of yourself, especially the creative self. Life becomes reactionary, not creative. You are constantly responding and manipulating, not creating. Art cannot flourish here. Creativity cannot flourish here. The muse cannot arrive.
The muse cannot arrive because there is no love inviting it. Your world is filled with need, necessity, manipulation, and attempts to control the uncontrollable. You try to predict what the insane will do, and you never can. Your world gets locked into a memory of what love was, perhaps, but it is locked nonetheless. There is no room to create without herculean effort, and Hercules is no friend of the muse.
There comes a time when you finally have to stop the craziness, and the only way to do that is to leave it. I finally did it. But that doesn't solve the creativity problem. It doesn't bring in the muse. Instead, it simply stops the cycle of crazymaking so you can begin to find your center again.
It is in that center that love eventually returns. Which type of love doesn't matter. Self-love or romantic love for another person. Love is the key. It re-opens you and the creative center because it invites in the muse. It gives her a place to land and languish luxuriously in your soul. Without love, she can’t land. Love becomes to the muse like a flower is to a butterfly. It sits there and waits. It shines and shines, and eventually, the butterfly muse arrives. Yes, it is like that. Patience is required. Self-care is needed. And love. The love and longing for oneself. This becomes the essence of creative self-recovery.
Julia Cameron’s book The Artist’s Way is a guided tour to this self-recovery of the creative soul. It is a journey and a helpful one. I recommend it heartily.
Please share this article with other interested creatives!