I Guess I Haven't Learned That Yet: Discovering New Ways of Living When the Old Ways Stop Working

by Shauna Niequist

For years, when I’ve taught writing workshops or been interviewed on the topic of creativity, someone inevitably asks about “being inspired”—or staying inspired or getting inspired—and I get so excited. I jump up on my little soapbox and tell them what I know about inspiration, that there’s a myth that it’s mercurial and wispy, that it’s floaty and unpredictable and you just cross your fingers and hope it lands on you at the right time. “Not true!” I tell them. Inspiration is my responsibility. Inspiration is part of the job description. It doesn’t strike like lightning. I lay myself open to receive it. You can’t manhandle it or make demands of it, but you can put yourself in the path of it. You make yourself available to it. It’s my job as a writer to live in such a way that every time I sit down to write, I’m inspired, not in the moment necessarily, but in my life, as a way of life. What this means is that it’s my job, literally, to go to art galleries and read poetry and go for walks and spend time with interesting people. It’s part of my work to read widely and learn new things and be curious and ask questions and wonder and doodle and dream, because living inspired is a requirement for rich creative work. You can’t watch bad television and endlessly scroll Twitter and expect great things to show up on the page. It’s your responsibility as a creative person to actively put yourself in the path of inspiration. I learned some of this out of practical necessity. When I wa...