The Restless Spirit
The Nudge: Seven Spiritual Steps to Creativity in Work and Business
"I think creativity is spiritual. I absolutely believe that."
F. Murray Abraham, Best Actor Oscar award winner in the movie, "Amadeus"
In the world of work and business, creativity is a highly valued phenomenon in any career, job and work setting. It is so important that it raises key questions: Where does creativity come from and can it be learned and developed? Is it a natural gift for some and a learned skill for others? Is it a function of our brain or of our mind? How can we access and productively use it?
Aristotle and Plato argued that our brain is a physical thinking mechanism and that our mind is seated in our soul, our innermost being. Given that our soul is joined with the greater spiritual intelligence of Spirit (Universe, One Mind, Divine, God, and other names) suggests that we are connected with this Infinite Source of all creative ideas. Quantum physics offers that the resulting creative energy is flowing to us 10,000 times faster than the speed of light, or even zero time, in no time. Our brain is stimulated to recognize the idea at the speed of thought, or about 500 milliseconds - a literal split second, the aha moment, the creative nudge.
Is there way to be in this creative flow more often than the infrequent “out of the blue” spontaneous insights from Spirit? My own experience and that of many others is, “Yes.” There is a simple creative process that is always available in our careers, jobs and work (and other parts of our lives) to invite a nudge and bring it to life. We can choose at any time to use this integrated human-spiritual resource that has worked since the beginning of time.
Seven Spiritual Steps to Work and Business Creativity can be applied practically in any individual or appropriate group situation. The steps are easy to learn, remember and practice. The time we spend with each step is up to us - minutes, hours, days, weeks or longer depending upon our situation. We can repeat all or some of the steps in given cases. Our inner sense guides us about this.
- Light: In prayer and meditation we invite Spirit to illumine our minds and allow spontaneous creative ideas to emerge and be recognized in our thoughts. These are ideas that support the dreams and desires for our business and work - perhaps extraordinary ideas that are not based upon anything we have preconceived.
- Belief: We hold unshakable faith in these ideas, knowing they have good purpose, and trust that we are guided in moving forward with them.
- Imagination: We give shape to the ideas by visualizing material results, engaging our brains to add thoughts, words and actions and bring our images into reality. We see how those ideas will work in reality.
- Understanding: We accept these ideas as the inspiration of Spirit and we become willing to follow them in our work - individually and with others - to realize our dreams. We strive to understand what is coming to us through this process and we respect its appearance.
- Judgment: We spend time to discern between thoughts that might be spurred by our human ego drives rather than those ideas born purely out of spiritual insight - always choosing the spiritual. We make a conscious effort to avoid judging ideas while they are still growing and developing.
- Gratitude: We are grateful for the exciting new ideas born out of Spirit. We hold an attitude of caring about everything we think, do, and say. Other people appreciate these creative inspirations and support them.
- Rest: We let go of our work and rest a while to let the new idea gestate and percolate. Returning to our work, we trust Spirit for ongoing guidance that leads us to the right and perfect results.
Google is one of many proven examples of effective spiritual creativity in work and business. Beginning with their 107th employee, Google now offers meditation courses to their 30,000 employees. The corporation is well known for its creativity, energy, focus, excellence, and rapid growth - and the company is profitable.
Inviting a creative nudge works for products, services, processes, and situations. It is worth our time - and there is no charge for this work of Spirit!
(Note: This article is an excerpt from Tom Zender’s book, God Goes to Work, written with James Cummins, published by John Wiley & Sons. Available in e-book and paper formats from Amazon.com and other booksellers.)
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