Creation

Overview
The realm of Divine Ideas is created by the Source. As individuals we become aware of Divine ideas. We increase this awareness through meditation or other activities that promote the Silence. As the Divine Ideas come into our consciousness, they are colored by race consciousness input from the subconscious mind. Ultimately they express through our individuality and within a specific medium of expression such as art, science, music, business or any number of other forms of expression and action.

The receptive clarity of Divine Ideas exists along a spectrum from very clear to unclear. The closer we are to the Source, the more consistent the individual expression of the Idea is to the Ideal. Lasting works of art or world-changing scientific theories are produced from an extremely accurate perception and reception of the Divine Idea from Mind. The less true the reception and transmission of the Divine Idea, the less true the manifestation of the Divine Idea within a medium will be. A good analogy is that of a copy machine making less clear copies from subsequent copies as compared to making high quality and clear copies from the original.

I have experienced many examples of the Creation process during my lifetime. For the purposes of this paper I will pick 3: music, software design and management.

Music
Music has always been a serious hobby of mine. I studied formally through the age of about 26 and took a couple of degrees, one in classical piano and one in jazz piano. After I left graduate school I never pursued it as a career, but have always maintained some connection throughout my life, performing in church or in local clubs every now and then.

A watershed era for me was when I learned the basic theory and chord structures for jazz piano after having played classical piano most of my college career. I was fascinated by the idea that I could know the basic chord progression and melody of a jazz standard and get together with other musicians and create arrangements on the spot. Once I worked on this area for a year or so, I moved away from reading music and began to play more and more by ear.

Learning to play jazz piano was a very transformative experience for me. Before that time, playing piano had been about accurately playing the notes on the page and adding a very small amount of interpretation to what was written. Once I discovered improvisation, this expanded a thousand-fold and my experience of spontaneous creativity was born.

On many occasions, when playing with a group, the experience might be somewhat mechanical, just trying to lay down what needs to be laid down at the right time. Sometimes I am thinking very intellectually, consciously aware of the chords and melodies that should be outlined to sound “correct” for a particular style or song.

But every now and then, when it is least expected, possibly during a solo, inspiration will strike and it seems as if I am not actually playing the music myself. The music seems to create itself and I am being led along for the ride, completely in the flow and the moment. At these times there is no conscious intellectual thought. The experience is more holistic and pervasive throughout my body, soul and mind. As Miles Davis once said, “you have to let the music get up in your body” (paraphrased). I can only imagine that if my skill level was higher that I’d have these holistic experiences more often.

Software Design
For most of my career I have been involved in the design of software systems in one role or another. In the early days when I was a junior programmer there was so much to learn that I did not think of it as a truly creative activity, especially compared to music. It was just a job that made money so that I could play music when I wanted.

I remember that I worked closed with a guy who seemed to be a very creative problem solver. He’d encounter extremely challenging problems and would seem to come up with algorithms very quickly. When I worked with him, I always felt that I could not really crack the solution and that I had to depend on him to formulate the algorithm which I could then code into being.

However, one day we were trying to design a data structure together and he was stumped. Somehow, an idea came into my mind that seemed obvious to me. When I told him he was ecstatic and told me that was very good. We went on to refine a design based on my insight. From this point on I had the confidence and continued to hone my ability to open my mind to solutions to problems rather than try to brute force a solution or feel like I had no ideas.

I began to relish the idea of thinking through a complex software system and come up with abstract concepts, data structures, communication pathways and user experience scenarios that had a good look and feel and satisfied customer needs. Sometimes the mental state needed was one resembling meditation. I needed silence and the ability to put my mind into a neutral state while thinking about the system passively, allowing ideas to flow without judgment so that I could try out different designs mentally and on paper.

Management
Once I became older and experienced in the software industry, I had both the desire and the opportunity to begin to manage and lead teams of gradually increasing size. I began to lose interest in the technical and creative challenges of software design and became fascinated with the challenges of leadership and management of technical products and development.

This leadership and management realm is where I currently spend most of my time. The experiences and techniques I learned earlier in my life have carried forward to help me progress in leadership roles. However, there are many more facets and dimensions that come into play.
In particular I have noticed a progression in myself from a mechanical style to a much more relaxed style that depends much more on my intuition than technical skill that I relied on in the early days of my management career. I get ideas of inspiration that are related to timing, personalities, team cohesion, management methodologies and other aspects of my daily work that seem to have a connection to the whole and the ideal, filtered to the culture or situation at hand.

I have found meditative practices to be especially useful in improving my process of creation in the various skills and qualities required for leadership and management.