by Ruth Landis

From the moment I arrived in New Buffalo, Michigan to write, there has been a severe weather advisory. The wind is fierce. It is loud and powerful and I can’t believe the little yachts in the harbor aren’t being picked up in a funnel cloud and taken to Oz. The four Weeping Willows outside my window are dancing like Sufi trance dervishes, I’m glad they can’t have a heart attack, because the wind just won’t let them rest. Will they be bald before their time? They are not ready to lose their leaves, and as the gusts sweep them to and fro lustfully, almost abusively, they hold on and their sweeping branches become even more flexible than ever, because they have to in order to survive this force. I worry about my old Magnolia back in Chicago. Will she be able to weather this powerful storm?

The outside reflects the inside. Why has this storm come to me this day, as I beckon my own creative force to surface? How is this nasty windstorm like my creativity? It is dark and scary. It can’t be stopped until it stops. It arrived unexpectedly. It sometimes feels like the angry breath of Goddess, and I can’t hide from it, though I may try. It has great impact. It will run its course and then it will return when you least expect it. It is very noisy. Then it is quiet and discreet. Has the storm ended? Oh no. Here it comes again. The building is shaking from it, and even with windows closed, I can hear it wailing, and moaning, and roaring. It is strong in its expression, varied, teasing, bombast. I wonder how the birds navigate it, but they do. They seem to ride it like a surfer on the ocean, becoming at one with it and not questioning or resisting where it will take them. It never seems to tire. As night descends, before my very eyes the lights on the harbor flicker as the Wind demands their obedience as well. It is overwhelming and invigorating. I was cold when I started writing this, and now I am very hot.

This is the creative force in at least one of her many forms. She brings about movement, manifestation, some destruction, that ultimately makes room for reconstruction. She is birth and death and birth. She digs away at the unseen. I know so many people who say with conviction, “I am just not creative.” That is like saying, “I am alive, but do not breathe.” Creativity is the life force itself. We are creating in each moment, in our thoughts and actions.

Creativity can be capricious, fleeting, sometimes hard to tame. It arrives, like the windstorm when it wants to. I must open and wait patiently, intentionally for its next visit, like a faithful lover. I must turn myself toward it. No amount of discipline can command its presence, or control how long it stays. But when it comes through the door, its dance is so delicious, so entertaining – time stands still. I am not young or old, infirmed or healthy, I am all that is – at one with the words, or the colors, the textures, the light and the dark, the ugly and the beautiful, there is no preference, just the movement of the wind through my soul.
Ruth Landis is a certified Body-Psychotherapist, certified hypnotherapist, Enneagram teacher, and Reiki Master, utilizing body/mind techniques, visualization, and guided imagery for greater awareness, presence, relaxation, and stress reduction, as well as working with trauma, chronic disease, and anxiety. Ruth also synthesizes all of her skills to create greater joy and ease in all modes of performance, public speaking, and group dynamics.