Creative work is soul work; it happens in that interior place where spiritual life forms the rest of life. Your spiritual beliefs and your creative drive reside in the same place-deep within you where everything important is stored. Doesn’t matter if you call this your spirit or something else. I call it the soul, because that’s nice and general and people can attach whatever meaning they want. It’s that interior location where the real you lives. The real you involves your drives, your beliefs, your desires, even your reactions to the physical world. This is where your stories happen, if you’re a writer. It’s where your visions appear, if you’re a painter. It’s where your curiosity and tenacity live, if you are a scientist or inventor. The work that evolves from you begins in that very honest, private place that I call the soul. So it cannot be separated easily from those other residents of the soul, which include your collection of beliefs, religious and otherwise.
– from “The Soul Tells a Story: Engaging Creativity with Spirituality in the Writing Life” by Vinita Hampton Wright Loyola Press
