030: What's trying to come through you?
Why articulating the vision for the creative project you're longing to complete isn't situated 'out there' but in deep, intuitive listening.
How do I articulate the vision for my creative project?
It comes up a lot, this question. I’ve asked it of myself many times—and it’s one I’ve been asked over the years by many of the creative professionals I’ve supported.
It’s an important thing to hold. It’s good to know and name where we’re heading—to navigate by that compass pointing north—before setting off. You might feel the stirrings of creative vision in the story idea that surfaces during meetings, or the song that plays in your head while you're doing dishes. The concept you sketch on a napkin, then shove in a drawer. What’s my vision for this? you think. Then the pressure to understand and name it, to pin it down, makes you disconnect. This need to ‘know’ what it is—with the absolute clarity of a dictionary definition—can create tension and pressure.
In truth, vision is often more subtle than that, quieter and more holistic.
I used to spend so much time ‘setting’ my vision before I embarked on a creative process. With past writing projects, I made mind maps on huge pieces of paper; I’d sketch out a statement about where the story should go. I’d produce elaborate plans, thinking that was vision (when really it was all about structure, which is something else entirely).
It’s dawned on me slowly, the realisation that I can experience vision differently.
The shift has come about through recognising that ‘fixing’ vision doesn’t feel easeful or aligned with flow. It’s come about through a deeper sense of being able to trust what is emerging (even if I don’t know what it is), while at the same time committing to executing, and finishing, the project. We can’t wallow in vision forever. But we can hold the vision lightly, aware of its capacity to shift and evolve, matching our human experience—just like creativity itself.
Another way I’ve come to consider it is this: it’s not about figuring out what the vision is; it’s about listening to what’s trying to come through you.
Your vision isn't something you necessarily need to ‘find’ or ‘set’—it's something that can keep showing up in small ways. It indicates where you could grow, how you can evolve. And it’s just possible that when you overlook those (often tiny, sometimes unremarkable) signs, you’re avoiding acting on your vision at all—because you’re looking further afield for something grander, or more purposeful or more ‘obviously’ life-changing.
What if we considered vision to be a kind of creative intelligence?
Ideas are driven by a single impulse: to be made manifest. And the only way an idea can be made manifest in our world is through collaboration with a human partner.
—Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic
When you’re in the space to listen, vision comes in the subtlest of ways.
It might be in fragments of words or images. Objects you feel drawn to—maybe aspects of nature: plants, trees. Objects as symbols of something beyond what you can materially see. This is the creative intelligence of the everyday. Attention, after all, as poet and essayist Mary Oliver writes in Upstream, ‘is the beginning of devotion.’
Thinking about it this way, we stop to notice what’s there, and learn to be present with it, rather than chase some definition ‘over there.’
For me, I have to be alert to the tendency to rush into ‘doing’: a desire to jump into the task, to ‘grab hold’ of the thing I’m envisioning. Action is important, for sure—without that, we don’t have an outcome; we don’t have a tangible expression of who we are and what we think, feel, believe.
But there’s another question to ask: how is this vision, this creative intelligence, initiating us into another way of being? Underneath it all is an inquiry: who do you want to BE when you create?
‘If you want to fly,’ writes Toni Morrison, ‘you have to give up the thing that weighs you down.’ Where is vision calling you to a new way of being, encouraging you to release old patterns and become someone new?
Through September, we’ll map a new way of engaging with vision.
First, we’ll work out how to recognise the creative intelligence of your vision—that ‘persistent visitor’ who keeps calling. Next, we’ll explore who that vision is inviting you to be: the new evolution of who you are. Finally, we’ll identify tangible steps: regular practices that move you closer to your vision and into action to accomplish what you are being called to do, as well as be.
What’s trying to come through you? Will you join me this month on the journey to find out?
Love, Rachel
See this article below (published a couple of years ago) for more about vision and charting a course through creativity.
Dead reckoning and creative process
In the time before we humans possessed instruments to help us navigate and measure, we had to rely on our perceptions of the natural world to help us chart a journey—initially on foot then later, after the invention of vehicles, with more speed: on water, on land, and in the air.
What’s next in your creative journey?
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Here's how I can support you:
Make an appointment for a virtual coffee (free). I hold 3-4 slots every month for a 20-minute chat so we can either get to know each other, or reconnect. This is for everyone! Perfect if you’re curious about meeting new people and making, or deepening, connections.
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Ah I feel these words. The pressure to have the vision and move from that never fully worked for me. It's been a rather 'backward' process - moving from 'what's trying to emerge from me' as you put it, and through that letting the vision take shape. I really vibe with the idea of holding the vision lightly. Such an insightful read ❤️