There is a deep connection between meditation and creativity, as meditation creates the zone of silence necessary for creativity to flourish. Meditation is the process of tilling the soil and adding the manure. Creativity is the seed that you plant in the fertile ground. Without fertile ground creativity cannot flourish; without fertile ground imagination cannot happen, because you will just be reflecting on what has happened.

Let us take an example. Imagine you are angry for some reason; there is immense anger in you and you are overcome by this emotion. If I tell you to be creative and solve a problem, will you be able to do it? Of course not, because your whole body, mind, and energy will be invested in the process of anger. Everything will be completely taken over by that anger, so how will you be able to creatively express yourself?

This is the biggest challenge people face when they want to be creative, when they want to come up with something new.  They could be a painter, a dancer, a singer, or a musician. Just ask them what their problem is with creativity. They will tell you that their problem is not to come up with something new, their problem is how to get rid of the old.  You can ask any musician and she will tell you that her problem is not composing a new song. Her problem is how to stop hearing the same old song that she already composed; her problem is that every time she tries to compose a new song, there is an existing song that interferes in her creative process.

Meditation clears the thought process and opens up a zone of emptiness. This emptiness is not negative; rather, this emptiness is filled with aliveness. It is tremendously positive, and when you touch this zone of emptiness, creativity becomes a natural consequence.

Let me give you one example. When I was in India, I used to teach meditation to music and dance schools. I have always liked interacting with individuals who express themselves creatively because they can connect with meditation very well. They have already undergone the struggle to find their zone of creativity. I met a dancer once and just asked her to describe her process of dancing to me.

She was an Indian classical dancer, which is one of the most difficult dance forms. Indian classical dance is not just a dance; it is an expression. You have to bring out your emotions, your feelings. You have to really be in the moment to be able to express yourself. Also, Indian classical dance cannot be one hundred percent choreographed, which means that the dancers learn about fifty percent of the dance and the rest is improvised during the dance. So no two Indian classical dancers will ever perform in the same way. There will always be something different either in their expressions, in the way they move, or in the ways they communicate things.

So, the dancer was very popular in her time and had been dancing for almost thirty years.  I asked her to tell me something about her dancing. She said, “Initially when I used to dance I was very self-conscious. I used to thoroughly learn the steps, but I didn’t like my dancing. I was able to perform the steps, but I was never able to bring in the rest. I was stuck with the idea of dancing, being there, and people looking at me—I was self-conscious.”

And then she said, “After a few years of dancing, after practicing, there came a moment when I realized that I was not the dancer.” From that point onward, she spoke about her experience of dancing like the way a mystic speaks about his meditative experience. She spoke like an awakened person, an enlightened person. She said, “When I enter that zone, I don’t know what is happening. I mean, the body dances by itself, it moves by itself. Initially, I can sense that there is an audience, that my body is there, I am dancing, and they are watching. Then, slowly I disappear and something in me takes over the dance. Afterward, when the dance is complete, I bow down and do the Namaste and the crowd starts shouting. That’s when I come back.” She said that all of her dance was performed by somebody else, not her.

She is telling the truth; a meditator knows this. Creativity is not something that you do, it is something that you allow to happen to you. That creative spark comes from the source of consciousness, from the source of divinity—it is not manmade. In art, music, and literature we are only vehicles. We are not the possessors of this creativity. The creativity is there. If we can just allow ourselves to be empty, then it will come flooding in.

When the dancer was not thinking about the audience, when she was not thinking about the body, when she was not thinking about the steps, she became so empty, so hollow, that this other force just came in and made her dance. It is the same with painting, music, and writing. In fact, there are so many writers who have said that the more they keep thinking about themselves as writers the more difficult it is to write. Because when they think about themselves as writers there is too much fear: the fear of rejection, not being able to express what they want to express, and the fear of not being good enough.

The moment you leave the creative process to existence and just surrender, you do not even have to do anything. This surrendering process happens through meditation. And that is why meditation connects all artists, all creative people in one stream. Meditation can take you to that zone of emptiness. From there, creativity is a natural consequence.

“Creation is something that happens from the inside and flows to the outside.”

Creativity is the very process of life. Everything that is happening around us is happening through the process of creativity. Creativity is not just an isolated domain or department of life. Creativity is the core of life. Everything begins with this creative energy and it flows outwards.

A few things are important to understand. The first is, creation is not something that just happens on the outside while you remain a mute spectator. Creation is something that happens from the inside and flows to the outside. This is the most important thing that we need to understand about creation and creativity. Creativity is not on the outside, but rather it is inside. The human mind has the ability to imagine, create thoughts, and generate emotions. When this is projected, when this energy flows outward as an expression of the individual, it becomes creativity.

So, creativity is really not a choice. It is not as if you can say, “Oh I don’t want to be creative, I’ll just go on living my life the way I’m living it. I don’t have to worry about creativity.” Creativity is what gives meaning and purpose to living, because all of us are here to express ourselves. And only in that expression life becomes complete and meaningful. If you are not expressing what you are meant to express, then that means part of you always remains closed, and part of you never reaches its highest potential, its completion.

That is the reason why there is this tremendous joy in being creative, in expressing yourself. And also there is tremendous contentment and fulfillment in expressing yourself because creativity is the very process of life. And since you are right in the middle of life, creativity is inevitable. You have to embrace creativity as a part of your life. Otherwise, life is going to be dull, and boring, and all the time you will be searching for some meaning.

See, Einstein used to say that there is nothing that is more powerful than imagination. All of his work, everything he did, he attributed to his ability to imagine things newly, freshly. He did not just walk on the same path that the mind takes everybody. He said that all of his theories came from a zone of pure imagination. And this imaginative ability of the mind, to see things that are not yet there, is the zone of creativity.

There is a vast difference between thinking and imagination. Thinking is more or less a regurgitation of what you have already acquired. You are just reflecting on what you have already done and on information you have already received. But, imagination is totally different. Imagination is new. That is why you cannot imagine when you are in pain and you cannot imagine when you are disturbed. Imagination happens from a zone of silence and stillness. Only when your mind is calm and relaxed, when it is not tormented by the disturbances of thinking, does creativity arise.