Inspiration

 

Photo by Cindy Liu on Unsplash

What inspires you? I was asked this question the other week and I confess it initially stumped me. Where to start? Should I list worthy books? Great individuals whose lives have spurred me on? There is also the world around me. Without fail, the mountains of the Swiss Alps take my breath away. The awesome sound of waves battering the rocks below Cornish clifftops stopped me in my tracks recently, even though it was pouring with rain. What does it even mean to be inspired? 

In a bid to delay answering, I seized that classic procrastination aide, a dictionary. I found several definitions for the term 'inspire.'

    To fill with the urge or ability to do something, especially something creative.

    To give rise to. 

So far, so familiar. But then:

    To breathe in air; inhale. 

I’d not really considered the process of creativity as being like breathing. Breathing is vital to life, but it’s one of those things we take for granted. We can control it, to a degree, but for the most part it just happens. We breathe in. We breathe out. Human adults do this up to 20,000 times a day, yet often we’re not even conscious of it. 

According to psychologists, when we are inspired, we are awakened by something external to us, which suggests new possibilities and prompts us to act. Inspiration can give us a renewed sense of energy and motivation or simply the resolve to keep going. Like the oxygen we breathe in, inspiration fuels our creativity.

For Christians though, there is another dimension. The word ‘inspiration’ comes from the Latin inspirare – to blow into or breathe upon (from in- ‘in’ + spirare ‘to breathe’). In old English, inspire meant to ‘breathe or put life or spirit into the human body.’ There are clear echoes here of Genesis 2:7 where ‘the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.’ The breath imparts not just physical life, but also spiritual vitality. As Job says, ‘the Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.’ (Job 33:4) ‘As long as my breath is still within me, the breath of God remains in my nostrils.’ (Job 27:3)

Our breathing connects us with the one who gave us life. Inspiration also began with God and, as we inhale, we return again and again to its source. ‘It is the spirit in a person, the breath of the Almighty, that gives them understanding.’ (Job 32:8) Through the work of the Holy Spirit, our minds start to align with God’s goals, as revealed in Jesus. And, of course, for every breath in, there is a corresponding breath out. With each exhalation, we have an opportunity to speak words of life. To point to the ‘now and not yet’ of God’s Kingdom and his redemptive work.

So, to rephrase my initial question, what are you inhaling to fuel your creativity at the moment? What in life is nourishing you and spurring you on? And what hope will you breathe out through your writing this week?

“To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work.”

~ Mary Oliver

Helen Hewitt is a baker, gardener, writer and maker. She lives in southwest London with  her husband and two young daughters. Formerly a doctor and clinical academic, she now runs a social enterprise, combining a microbakery and community gardening project (@nourishandgrow_food). Helen is a member of the Community of Hopeweavers. 

You can find more of Helen's writing at https://warpandweft.substack.com/