Julia Cameron > Quotes

“Most of us are not raised to actively encounter our destiny. We may not know that we have one. As children, we are seldom told we have a place in life that is uniquely ours alone. Instead, we are encouraged to believe that our life should somehow fulfill the expectations of others, that we will (or should) find our satisfactions as they have found theirs. Rather than being taugh to ask ourselves who we are, we are schooled to ask others. We are, in effect, trained to listen to others' versions of ourselves. We are brought up in our life as told to us by someone else! When we survey our lives, seeking to fulfill our creativity, we often see we had a dream that went glimmering because we believed, and those around us believed, that the dream was beyond our reach. Many of us would have been, or at least might have been, done, tried something, if...
If we had known who we really were.”
― Julia Cameron

“Life is a spiritual dance and that our unseen partner has steps to teach us if we will allow ourselves to be led. The next time you are restless, remind yourself it is the universe asking 'Shall we dance?”
― Julia Cameron

“As you move toward a dream, the dream moves toward you.”
― Julia Cameron

“The voice of our original self is often muffled, overwhelmed, even strangled, by the voices of other people’s expectations.”
― Julia Cameron

“God does not give us more than we can handle," I am told but I wonder if God doesn't overestimate me just a little. Or perhaps, and this is likely, I underestimate God.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“You do not need to work to become spiritual. You are spiritual; you need only to remember that fact. Spirit is within you. God is within you. (67)”
― Julia Cameron, God is No Laughing Matter

“Leap, and the net will appear.”
― Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

“In times of pain, when the future is too terrifying to contemplate and the past too painful to remember, I have learned to pay attention to right now. The precise moment I was in was always the only safe place for me.”
― Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

“We should write because it is human nature to write. Writing claims our world. It makes it directly and specifically our own. We should write because humans are spiritual beings and writing is a powerful form of prayer and meditation, connecting us both to our own insights and to a higher and deeper level of inner guidance.

We should write because writing brings clarity and passion to the act of living. Writing is sensual, experiential, grounding. We should write because writing is good for the soul. We should write because writing yields us a body of work, a felt path through the world we live in.

We should write, above all, because we are writers, whether we call ourselves that or not.”
― Julia Cameron, The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life

“Creativity requires faith. Faith requires that we relinquish control.”
― Julia Cameron

“We are not accustomed to thinking that God's will for us and our own inner dreams can coincide.”
― Julia Cameron

“It takes constant vigilance not to slip into negativity or simple apathy. It takes courage to believe over any given period of time that we are getting better and not sliding into decline.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“Sometimes the dying live more fiercely and wisely than the rest of us. (146)”
― Julia Cameron, God is No Laughing Matter

“Art is not about thinking something up. It is the opposite -- getting something down.”
― Julia Cameron

“Mystery is at the heart of creativity. That, and surprise...As creative channels, we need to trust the darkness. ”
― Julia Cameron

“Writing is like breathing, it's possible to learn to do it well, but the point is to do it no matter what.”
― Julia Cameron, The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life

“We need to bridge our sense of loneliness and disconnection with a sense of community and continuity even if we must manufacture it from our time on the Web and our use of calling cards to connect long distance. We must “log on” somewhere, and if it is only in cyberspace, that is still far better than nowhere at all. (264)”
― Julia Cameron, God is No Laughing Matter

“Survival lies in sanity, and sanity lies in paying attention...the capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.”
― Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

“Artistic anorexia & sexual avoidance have the same root fears – fear of intimacy, fear of exposure, fear of failure”.”
― Julia Cameron, The Vein of Gold

“Making art has taught me that the tiniest smidgen of progress is something to be cherished.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“Being in the mood to write, like being in the mood to make love, is a luxury that isn't necessary in a long-term relationship. Just as the first caress can lead to a change of heart, the first sentence, however tentative and awkward, can lead to a desire to go just a little further.”
― Julia Cameron, The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life

“I ask to be made beautiful like the trees are beautiful, each growing according to a unique plan. Lop off a limb and and the tree will accommodate it's loss, still growing and still beautiful. It is my hope to be able to flourish in a similar fashion, taking on the shape and dimensions that is intended for me.”
― Julia Cameron, The Writing Diet: Write Yourself Right-Size

“Just as a good rain clears the air, a good writing day clears the psyche.”
― Julia Cameron, The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life

“Often it is tenacity, not talent, that rules the day.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“There is no fact, no detail of our life too sordid for God's intervention. God has seen murder. God has seen rape. God has seen drug addiction's and alcoholism's utter degradation. God is available to us no matter what our circumstances. God can find us in a crack house. God can find us crumpled in a doorway or cowering on a park bench. We need only reach out to discover that God reaches back. We are led a step at a time even when we feel we are alone. Sometimes God talks to us through people. Sometimes God reaches us through circumstances or coincidence. God has a million ways to reach out to us, and when we are open to it, we begin to sense the touch of God coming to us from all directions.”
― Julia Cameron, Faith and Will: Weathering the Storms in Our Spiritual Lives

“Pray to catch the bus, then run as fast as you can.”
― Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

“The doing of something productive regardless of the outcome is an act of faith. The doing of a small something when a large something is too much for us is perhaps especially an act of faith. Faith means going forward by whatever means we can.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“we should write because writing brings clarity and passion to the act of living. writing is sensual, experiential, grounding. we should write because writing is good for the soul. we should write because writing yields us a body of work, a felt path through the world we live in.”
― Julia Cameron

“Perfectionism doesn't believe in practice shots. It doesn't believe in improvement. Perfectionism has never heard that anything worth doing is worth doing badly--and that if we allow ourselves to do something badly we might in time become quite good at it. Perfectionism measures our beginner's work against the finished work of masters. Perfectionism thrives on comparison and competition. It doesn't know how to say, "Good try," or "Job well done." The critic does not believe in creative glee--or any glee at all, for that matter. No, perfectionism is a serious matter.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“Serious art is born from serious play.”
― Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

“Wherever you are is always the right place. There is never a need to fix anything, to hitch up the bootstraps of the soul and start at some higher place. Start right where you are.
”
― Julia Cameron

“Fatigue can make it hard to have faith. Too much busyness can make it hard to have faith. Too much of too little solitude can impact faith. For that matter, so can a bout of hunger or overwork, anything carried to an extreme. Faith thrives on routine. Look at any monastery and you will see that. Faith keeps on keeping on.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“When you feel yourself to be in critical condition, you must treat yourself as gently as you would a sick friend.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“Agendas tend to drain the life out of relationships.”
― Julia Cameron, Letters to a Young Artist: Building a Life in Art

“And why are we supposed to be serious about God? Did God show up and crack the whip? “You there, Annie in Ohio, I see you laughing a lot and frankly it really pisses Me off . . . “ (50)”
― Julia Cameron, God is No Laughing Matter

“It is all too easy as an artist to allow the shape of our career to be dictated to us by others. We can so easily wait to be chosen. Such passivity invites despair. To remain healthy and vital, artists must stay proactive in their own behalf.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“When we walk, the two halves of our brains converse.”
― Julia Cameron

“Creativity - like human life itself - begins in darkness.”
― Julia Cameron

“No matter what your age or your life path, whether making art is your career or your hobby or your dream, it is not too late or too egotistical or too selfish or too silly to work on your creativity.”
― Julia Cameron, The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

“We will experience the life we have the faith to experience.”
― Julia Cameron, Faith and Will: Weathering the Storms in Our Spiritual Lives

“Artists are visionaries. We routinely practice a form of faith, seeing clearly and moving toward a creative goal that shimmers in the distance - often visible to us, but invisible to those around us.”
― Julia Cameron

“A career must be husbanded. Care must be taken. Everyday must bring some small bit of progress. How would an artist with any self-worth act? Act that way.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“Basic Principles:

1. Creativity is the natural order of life. Life is energy: pure creative energy.

2. There is an underlying, in-dwelling creative force infusing all of life -- including ourselves.

3. When we open ourselves to our creativity, we open ourselves to the creator's creativity within us and our lives.

4. We are, ourselves, creations. And we, in turn, are meant to continue creativity by being creative ourselves.

5. Creativity is God's gift to us. Using our creativity is our gift back to God.

6. The refusal to be creative is self-will and is counter to our true nature.

7. When we open ourselves to exploring our creativity, we open ourselves to God: good orderly direction.

8. As we open our creative channel to the creator, many gentle but powerful changes are to be expected.

9. It is safe to open ourselves up to greater and greater creativity.

10. Our creative dreams and yearnings come from a divine source. As we move toward our dreams, we move toward our divinity.”
― Julia Cameron

“. . . reaching toward God has made me more me and not less me. I was always afraid you would erase me. Instead, you are helping me to sketch me in.”
― Julia Cameron, Prayers from a NonBeliever

“We have this idea that we need to be in the mood to write. We don't.”
― Julia Cameron

“ Mystery is at the heart of creativity. That, and surprise.”
― Julia Cameron

“FESTIVITY BREEDS CREATIVITY. RIGIDITY BREEDS DESPAIR”
― Julia Cameron, Walking in this World

“What we really want to do is what we are really meant to do. When we do what we are meant to do, money comes to us, doors open for us, we feel useful, and the work we do feels like play to us.”
― Julia Cameron

“So much of an artist's career hinges on the sense that we are going somewhere, that we are not just trapped by the four walls of wherever we are. For creative sanity, I must believe that if I just do the next right thing, a path will unfold for me.”
― Julia Cameron, Finding Water: The Art of Perseverance

“Far from making me feel different and special, my [spiritual] experiences made me feel the same, ordinary, and interconnected. If I felt more spiritual, everyone else felt more spiritual as well. (276)”
― Julia Cameron, God is No Laughing Matter