Yesterday, I put my mom and my niece on a plane, marking the end of three weeks of unparalleled family fun. Today, I turn toward my book and prepare to spend the heart of the fall creating.

I’ve been reading Flora Bowley’s book, Brave Intuitive Painting, and it’s inspired me in so many ways. I love the creative process—learning more about others’ creative process always encourages me and gives me practical help for continuing in my own. I especially love reading commentary from fine artists (as well as devour every episode of Project Runway, of course).

Flora talks about the importance of “spiraling in” and “spiraling out” in painting. You move close up to the canvas and you work a specific area of the painting and then you spiral back out to see the larger composition. She writes, “I approach my paintings from a place of wild and free letting go as well as from a place of contemplation, thoughtful choice making, and commitment to my vision. This is not a linear process. It does not travel from chaos to order or from order to chaos. Instead, this spiraling approach moves fluidly between letting go and making choices, integrating these equally important ways of painting along the way” (93).

The spiraling out is about assessment, an editing eye, a look at the overall vision. The spiraling in is about composing without the inner critic in tow, opening up, allowing. I love how these are both such important parts of the creative process and life in general: intention and abandon.

This interplay of intention and abandon illuminates so much of what we carry inside us: our fear of committing or making a mistake, our fear of being great, the toxic voices of our inner critics, our distrust of our own intuition, our issues with envy and comparison.

Creating always puts us in touch with the deeper waters, which is why I believe it is so healing. Beauty and vulnerability intersecting.

Flora also talks about the power of making commitments in your work: committing to the now as a way to gain momentum and keep the process flowing. I love this because I find myself stuck at times, trying to fix or figure out. It’s helpful—in life and in creating—to make a commitment to what’s in front of you, knowing that more will be revealed. We learn that the process can be trusted. Clarity unfolds.

Flora includes these two quotes on following our intuition and committing:

“You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you’ll discover will be wonderful. What you’ll discover is yourself.” –Alan Alda

“The irony of commitment is that it’s deeply liberating—in work, in play, and in love.” –Anne Morriss

These principles can be applied to so much of life. We spiral in with freedom and abandon and then we must spiral out and assess and make decisions. We commit, knowing that more will be revealed. We trust the process. We allow space for our intuition to be heard.

These are the practices I will be really leaning into this fall. Rolling up my sleeves. Spiraling in and composing, composing, composing. Spiraling out and making sure what I am making aligns with  my overall vision. Committing when needed in order to keep momentum. Redirecting when needed. Allowing a wide lane to play, intuit, ideate, assess.

All the while remembering God has offered us a spacious place, a broad grace. We just have to show up, breathe, and keep the pen moving. These are radical, subversive acts. Brazen.

We are all creating something. May we all have the courage to show up to the blank canvas, the blank page, and begin again. God give us the grace to move fluidly between letting go and making choices. May we allow the art to emerge in us and through us.

Amen.