As with anything generative, the original source of an idea is perpetually unknown (or assigned through faith). I can point to the scattered nodes of knowledge synthesized in any given thought, but from where does energy for the synthesis come from? The mechanism is hidden, the mechanism is illusory.
Yet the immediate reaction as the bubble rises and pops is revulsion. I assign myself as the source and assume the worst. An isle devoid of validation, the receptacle for the thought is slippery. Cilia brush the perimeter of the thought, testing it, an involuntary action capable of being acted on. I will not. I connect myself to the nearest feed and allow my particular revulsion to settle into a generalized, holistic revulsion of my capacity for self-doubt.
It is self-doubt that reacts. Self-doubt coupled with a descending, reactionary pride that would dare to claim the source as my own.
The idea remains bobbing in the receptacle, and it is sometimes strong enough to motivate me. It has to find me in particular mood: low cortisol, serotonin satiated, well fed, hydrated, doing just fine, relaxed and in repose (my self-imposed ‘criteria’ for creative conditions is itself an excuse to remain idle in fear and becomes another object of my wandering revulsion). Occasionally I will flirt with comprehensive collection, writing down every idea in an effort to evaluate and cull later. I’ll assume they’re all garbage and never look again.
But I’m motivated: I decide to think. Strain against my disintegrating attention. Thinking exchanges the currency of attention into transmission for the idea. The flame burns hotter and more bubbles rise, pressurizing the receptacle. The idea is no longer atomized but a collection of molecules, vibrating with potential energy. I, my agency, enters the account in the thinking itself: my attention forms His ideas.
Creative skill (and this is medium independent) is the capacity for focus as the vibrations threaten to overwhelm. Visions of the idea expressed could explode in manic orgasm, efficiently convert over time, or leak out in your piss. Craft is the way tradition has learned how people best resonate with a given medium. Counterpoint, 440 hz, On Writing, expository or persuasive, five paragraphs (forgive me), Poetics.
Creative skill is the grace not to think of yourself as such a shithead all the time. Self-doubt is unattractive, anti-beautiful, ungrateful. The haunt of revulsion in the eternal recurrence — it’s not too late for me.