Although we tend to think of writing in secular terms, it is actually a spiritual path. We can consciously invite spiritual guidance. A simple prayer is relevant: “Okay, God, you take care of the quality, I’ll take care of the quantity.” When I was first told this prayer, I thought it was far-fetched. I had trouble believing that the spirit of the universe could take an interest in my prose. But as I retired from my ego’s need to be a brilliant author, my writing became more clear. No longer aimed at being impressive and brilliant, it aimed instead to be forthright. I came to believe that “creator” was another word for “artist.” I trusted the Great Artist—in the words of Dylan Thomas, “the force that through the green fuse drives the flower.” I tried to think of myself like a flower, mysteriously blooming. I tried to be humbly obedient. I came to believe that honesty and authenticity could capture my reader’s faith.
Writing Morning Pages is like sending a telegram to the universe. We give our precise coordinates: here, and how, I am. The universe, in response, acts on our behalf. Although we may not call it that, we have sent a prayer. Implicit in each day’s pages is the request “Please help me,” and the universe does.
Writing pages, we dare to mention our dreams. The universe acts on those dreams, giving us what we need, if not what we want. At their root, Morning Pages are a prayer—a prayer of petition. We ask the universe for our dreams, wants, and needs, and the universe complies with our requests. We are met more than halfway by a benevolent something that we may hesitate to call God.
Although we may be reluctant to name it, spirituality is afoot. Our pages symbolize our willingness to talk to—and hear from—God. Writing pages, we swing open an inner door. In our imagination, we read an inscription: “This is the way to a faith that works.”
Morning Pages, too, “work.” As we clarify on the page our yearnings, those yearnings begin to be met. As one practitioner told me, “I’m a Jew and an atheist, hardly your target audience, but pages work for me.” What do we mean by “pages work”? What we are talking about is nothing less than a spiritual awakening. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life shifts. Where before, the world was forbidding, it comes now to be benevolent. We meet with ease situations that used to baffle us. Over time, we recognize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.
Are these extravagant promises? I don’t think so. They are being fulfilled among us, sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They always materialize as we do the work of writing pages.
Whether we conceive of pages as putting us in touch with a benevolent something, or we think that pages are themselves that something, matters little. What counts is the daily practice: a form of meditation as well as prayer.
Morning Pages are a two-way street. We “send” and then we “receive.” Ideas come to us—thoughts, intuition, inklings. We are guided and led, led forward carefully and well. I recently heard from a man who has been doing Morning Pages for twenty-two years. He is an atheist, and pages themselves are his higher power. He has written thirteen movies, leading me to tell him, “You don’t believe in God, but God clearly believes in you.” Increased productivity is a common fruit of Morning Pages. As we work with the pages, we become more bold, taking risks as the pages urge, moving from project to project without excruciating pauses in between. As we learn to doubt our doubts, we expand, becoming larger and braver. Pages give us a safety net. Our risks, once seeming too large, become smaller. After all, the pages catch us if we fall. They partner us. Like circus acrobats, we are expertly “caught.” When used in conjunction with Artist Dates, Morning Pages promote synchronicity. We are increasingly in the right place at the right time. Our “luck” improves as we come to count on it. Morning Pages yield a spiritual path. We become more surefooted as we write. We speak to the universe, and it answers.
When we begin writing with where we are and how we feel in our Morning Pages, we are actually formulating a prayer. We are sending a telegram to the universe that says, “This is my precise place and these are my precise feelings. Can you help me?” As we delineate our position, we are sending an SOS. We are saying exactly what we feel, and that is an invitation to the universe to intervene on our behalf. Writing on our creative projects later in the day, the same philosophy applies.
Ours is a secular time, and we often fail to realize the power and potency of the written word as prayer. Putting pen to the page, listening for inspiration, we are uttering the perennial artist’s prayer, “Please help me.” It matters less sometimes what we write than that we write at all. Our words lead us to authenticity, just as authenticity leads us to our words. As we describe our state with specificity, we are given the gift of humility, and from humility, great art is born. Consider the Mona Lisa: the precise rendering of an enigmatic smile. Writing carefully, we, too, render the enigma that is the human condition. Great art is born from the prayer, “Please help me render what I see and what I hear.”
From Write for Life by Julia Cameron. Copyright © 2023 by the author and reprinted with permission of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
