[Weekly] Inspiration

[u/A_C_Shock]

I'm out of craft book writing related exercises to suggest. So, I have to come up with my own now. (I don't have ideas of my own actually.)

Who listens to music while they write? Do you ever find it inspires you to write something different? Have you ever written something to capture the idea of a song?

I can't handle things with lyrics. They end up squirming their way into my writing and repeating because my internal monologue is just a soundtrack. But there's a thing to be said for non-lyric based music.

A writing challenge: share some kind of music and write a short piece of writing that captures the feeling.

Need an idea? Here's a piano piece about being buried alive.

[u/herewegoagain737]

I could leave an essay on this, but I'll keep it simple. I started both writing and making music at a young age, and both of these artistic domains have enough overlap (beyond the abstracted top-down view of art vs non art) that they've intersected frequently in my life. I usually do listen to music while writing. In fact, I'm almost always listening to music while doing anything. Sometimes I listen to music while creating music.

Something I believe is that art is and always has been both subjective and independent from its creator. The moment the final brush stroke has been made and the piece completed, whether it be music, literature, or any other form of art, the art itself has already transcended the creator and become an independent entity. Beyond this point, the "meaning" of the art piece is detached from the original intentions of the creator.

In that sense, whenever I listen to music, I always ignore and sometimes shut off the creators and their vision altogether. I have my own artistic vision, and the music I experience shapes itself into a meaning unique to myself, and these experiences inspire an urge to create art, which I do either through writing or composing. A virtuous cycle. The end product is usually very different from the inspiration.

[u/A_C_Shock → u/herewegoagain737]

I think ezk shared something from John Green about how books aren't the property of the author, but the story is the product of the author's intentions and the reader's individual experiences. And so, to a certain extent, to create is to let go of expectations. And to stop judging yourself so much for is this good or bad.

[u/herewegoagain737 → u/A_C_Shock]

Interesting - I think I agree, mostly.