Creativity’s Power!

Hildegard

            My brain has been buzzing and bubbling ever since I attended a workshop a few days ago on the amazing Hildegard of Bingen (1098 – 1179) a Benedictine abbess.

Hers was not an easy life, the tenth child of the family, sickly, given to the Church (with dowry) at the age of 8, where she, with her anchoress teacher and one other child, were incarcerated in a bricked-up room with only a window, until she was 23.  Although she was frequently ill, she spent her whole life battling for the rights of the women in her convent against a misogynist church-and-secular society that believed “the wickedness of women is greater than all the other wickedness in the world”.  Hildegard was fearless in working for recognition, for the integrity of women, sometimes writing obsequiously self-effacing grovelling letters to get her way, sometimes implying that the Church leaders themselves were in league with the Devil.  This protest continued all her life, up to two days before her death. 

Nevertheless, Hildegard is known for her originality and holiness, stretching the boundaries for women, and her emphasis on the greenness, the life force of nature that nurtures the human soul.  Her creative works span theology, stunning art depicting her visions, botany, medicine, visionary literature, lecture touring (to mainly male audiences) about the need for drastic reform in the corruption of the church, and an opera, the oldest medieval morality play, (and possibly the forerunner of the “Everyman” series). Music, she believed, is the source of spiritual healing.  Her compositions are still sung today. 

Wow. What a woman. How can someone so battered down, so suppressed, produce such a wealth of creativity and courage?  However is it possible? And then I thought…

What if….

What if her abundant creativity was not a luxury or an add-on? An either/or?  A both/and? What if it was the creativity itself that fired her energy, her set of choices that made her so human, and adhered her to her ideals?  What if this creativity charged her tenacity, her unwillingness to accept wrong practices and corruption even though they were the norm?

And, today — what if creativity is the powerful, vital, essential element to our human spirit, not a hobby we pick up only when we have time? “Something to do when I retire”?  What if it fires our inner beings into proactivity?  What would that be like?

Hey wait.

I have seen creativity being acted out today!  Not for a hobby, but for holding life together.  It never clicked until Hildegard.  Unlike her, our results may not come out as glorious or prolific as hers, but it is the act of doing it that is vital to our brain, our soul..

There are people today who live complicated lives and are deliberately creativity at the same time. Some of them are friends with whom I work and live closely. Others are ones I have heard about.

• Messiah sung in a Japanese Concentration Camp.
• Elgar, feeling inadequate and looked down upon, because he never got a university degree, but we certainly do enjoy his music!
• Jokes when under oppressive regimes (or COVID) are the funniest and most applicable.
• Little ditties, or a perfectly-composed piece of music emerging as gifts of cheer, from a person who is piled high with complex tasks, unable to be completed.
• Someone being deliberately, persecuted, who manages to write a haiku at the end of each day.
• A community encourager, valuing everyone’s gifts, who writes poetry that no one ever sees.
• A student horribly bullied at school who comes home and spends time sketching.
• Two friends, caring for their weakening partners, cling to their musical instruments to sustain and enable them in these agonising times. “I couldn’t live without music,” they both told me individually.
• A prolific artist, turning out painting after painting, while caring for a partner in deep constant pain.

Is Creativity the life blood of these people?  Seems so.  And what could it do for others whose lives are deadened?  The results are not important.  It’s the act of doing it, no matter what the outcome.

Moreover, if this is even partially true, shouldn’t we be pouring funds into the Creative Arts as if Life Itself depends on it….because it does?

Sweet Potato Rosti

My organic vegetable box provided me with so many weekly contributions of sweet potato, there was always an opportunity for a new recipe.  Here’s one I found in my lever-arch scrapbook.  I recognised the unique handwriting of a dear friend, bringing back decades of memories .

It is simple, involves a bit of meditative potato-grating, and that’s about it.

Ingredients:

750 gms sweet potato, 2 Tbs olive oil, 1 chopped onion, 1clove garlic, crushed, Black pepper, salt, 200 gms grated cheese 7 ozs. 2 eggs, beaten.

Preheat oven to 220 degrees C  Gas mark 7  428 degrees F.  Grate peeled sweet potato, roll in a tea towel and squeeze out the water.

Heat half the oil, saute onion and garlic 4 minutes. Season with black pepper and salt.

Mix half the cheese and beaten eggs with the sweet potatoes.

Serve immediately with a crisp salad and crusty bread.

My friend’s suggested options: 

• Stilton cheese is good on top.
• Add dried mixed herbs.
• Chilled white wine a good accompaniment.

Last month’s blog: EXAMS.  Thanks so much for your responses – they were wonderful.  They including a glass eye for invigilating a room, a little girl who did everything she could to avoid Friday afternoon’s mental arithmetic [if she got it wrong she had to stand at the back of the class], a boy whose exams influenced his choice of career, and someone who hardly wanted to talk about it, it was so awful.  All comments came from adults, so they managed to get to adulthood!