The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity

Cameron opens her introduction to this edition with an anecdote about a woman who approaches her in a café and tells her she looks like Julia Cameron. When Cameron states that she is Julia Cameron the woman tells her that The Artist’s Way shaped her into a novelist. Cameron highlights her belief that creativity is a spiritual practice and uses other mini anecdotes to reinforce the value of the practices in the book, such as the woman who has bestowed the book on her family because of her success with the practices (particularly the morning pages and artist dates) and the unnamed individual who became sober and a screenwriter after discovering her book. She believes not enough people have been encouraged regarding their creativity and seeks to build a system where anyone can tap into their creativity.

Cameron introduces the idea that she teaches her students how to let themselves be creative. She establishes the definition of “God” early on as the source of creativity, not necessarily some pre-conceived notion of God. She makes the definition expansive to encompass all spiritual ideas of God rather than pushing a particular religious understanding of God to reach as broad an audience as possible while still emphasizing the importance of connectedness to the spiritual source. She acknowledges how so many people are blocked creatively and touches briefly on why as a prelude to the deeper exploration of these blocks in later chapters. One of the main reasons people are blocked is fear: fear of relinquishing control, fear of failure (and success), fear of being too old or young, and so forth. She acknowledges the real challenges these fears pose but makes a case for the spiritual practice of creativity by telling her own story. She had to become sober before she “learned to turn [her] creativity over to the only god [she] could believe in, the god of creativity” (xviii). She was admittedly scared as she stepped into her power as a creative person who was both sane and sober, but she began working with blocked writers, and the number grew as she found success in sharing her lessons with them. After prompting from her teaching partner Mark Bryan, she then decided to record her methods in this book to share “as a blueprint for do-it-yourself recovery” (xx). The whole reason Cameron wrote this book was because she believes everyone has creative gifts to share, and life is about the process of exploring, cultivating, and sharing those gifts.

In this section, Cameron establishes what readers can expect from the course and the headspace they need to occupy to make full use of it. She establishes her belief that creativity is a spiritual practice and outlines a series of 10 basic principles for the reader, which basically ask the reader to accept the idea that creativity is a natural gift from God that everyone has and should be open to exploring as a spiritual practice. She then details how this book can be approached for creative recovery. She says that a weekly approach requires about 7 to 10 hours a week, and the course can be completed solo or in a group. She lists some of the different blocks that inhibit creative growth, such as allowing time, money, or ego to cause fear and prevent creative activity. Cameron states the book’s goal is to help creatives recognize and nurture their creativity while enjoying the process.

There are a few fundamental tools required for the course, which Cameron details here: the morning pages, the artist date, and the creativity contract. The morning pages are an exercise in meditation, which asks writers to sit down and dump what it’s in their head onto the page consistently every morning without judgment. The morning pages aren’t intended to be art or good, and they are personal, so this is really a space to free the mind from its censor, which will be important for the course. The artist date is a once a week commitment to embark on a date to do something fun and inspiring. It’s not about spending money on an expensive excursion but rather letting your inner child play, whatever that looks like. Finally, the creativity contract is a commitment to completing the course, even if that means the contract has to be slightly amended. The contract has the participant acknowledge that there will be issues and emotional challenges along the way and requires them to commit to self-care during their commitment to the course. It must be signed and dated.