Art – Do We Ever Know What We’re Creating?

A while ago I left a comment on this post talking about art and the act of creating and I guess you could say that inspired me to write this now.

It’s weird because as a writer, there’s loads of ways you can go about writing, although the final result is somewhat the same. Sometimes you take a prompt and write from there; sometimes you create a whole character or world before you start; sometimes you just write off the top of your head and see what happens. I think the latter is the most interesting and that’s mostly what I’ll be talking about here.

A lot of the time I have the urge to just write out of nowhere and so I frequently write with no prompts and just see what happens. It’s always strange because as I’m writing it, I don’t really know what I’m saying; I don’t know what anything means, and I’m not entirely sure if it’s the portrayal of my own thoughts or not. However I feel like a lot of the time we are subconsciously aware of what words we are spilling onto the page all along. Whether we realise it or not, they are probably manipulated versions of our own thoughts; things we’ve buried so deep that they only seem to reappear when we accidentally dig them out.

This has happened to me quite a few times. I write stuff without meaning to say anything and then on reading it over think, oh is this actually how I feel? And it’s kind of like writing helps me learn things about myself that I’m not willing to accept or admit in everyday life. It’s kind of like therapy.

And sometimes writing does become exaggerated. It’s hard to draw up a line between imagination and reality when we’re unsure of our own feelings. But whether they’re real thoughts or not, the process itself is still important. It’s still a release in some way. The escapism of writing is what matters most of all.

Whenever I feel the urge to let something out or explain it in a way that normal words can’t, I turn to writing. And that’s what art in general is all about.

What kind of art is your escape?

Do you ever know what you’re creating?