Aldous Huxley viewed the mind as a filter, and its function as a limiting of perception.
The burden of the creative mind is that in many cases it has fewer such limits. It is a problem of perceptual simultaneity, of observation and interest given diverse events, whether associated or disconnected from each other, at once. Rather than approaching reality by ordering it according to learned constructs of, for instance, linear time or spatial relationships, as Huxley's "filter" would suggest, the sense of the imagination is open to more extravagant amounts of stimuli. Rather than hearing the conversation alone, it is heard within a field of sounds, memories, impressions of emotional connections and intellectual references. One is not merely reading The Iliad, but is a phantom presence moving among the black ships, hearing the murmur of the wine-dark sea.
The difficult nature of such thinking is easily imagined, and more difficult still is coming to terms with obligations of communication and empathy with those whose hearts and minds and ways of doing things are different, yet equally human and consequential.
If one would actually create, one might be well advised to create equilibrium, that is to say, to develop effective method of execution, manner of presentation, and works with historical and cultural perspective that offer aesthetic appeal as well.
And there is no compromise necessary in doing so.
The burden of the creative mind is that in many cases it has fewer such limits. It is a problem of perceptual simultaneity, of observation and interest given diverse events, whether associated or disconnected from each other, at once. Rather than approaching reality by ordering it according to learned constructs of, for instance, linear time or spatial relationships, as Huxley's "filter" would suggest, the sense of the imagination is open to more extravagant amounts of stimuli. Rather than hearing the conversation alone, it is heard within a field of sounds, memories, impressions of emotional connections and intellectual references. One is not merely reading The Iliad, but is a phantom presence moving among the black ships, hearing the murmur of the wine-dark sea.
The difficult nature of such thinking is easily imagined, and more difficult still is coming to terms with obligations of communication and empathy with those whose hearts and minds and ways of doing things are different, yet equally human and consequential.
If one would actually create, one might be well advised to create equilibrium, that is to say, to develop effective method of execution, manner of presentation, and works with historical and cultural perspective that offer aesthetic appeal as well.
And there is no compromise necessary in doing so.
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