Anisette Studio

From Muddy Brook Road Cottage  1/10/2024

In my research to learn if other books existed on the topic of trance and the creative process, I did find other authors, saving the books so I could check them out later on. First I want to glean the thoughts of Tobi Zausner. (The Creative Trance.)

Tobi Zausner points out that the creative trance has diversity and antiquity on page 2. It’s been around a long time! She states that the “Creative trances are natural, varied and widespread.” Until I began reading this book, I had no thoughts about how the word trance would fit when it came to the creative process. I like the points she is making. She points out that how long this state varies in its duration, according to when it occurs. I found it interesting however that she mentions that the range of a trance state is from something that is “relaxation to rapture”. I had not thought of this. She continues her statement, “states of trance are essential aspects of human consciousness and distinct from waking awareness. Levels of creative trance can vary from light pleasant engagement in a task, congruent in many ways with Csikszentmihalyi”s state of flow. (1990, 1996). (Now, what is that?) Back to the end of that sentence ___state of flow, (1990,1996), to a deeper absorption that seems to obliterate all sense of the external world/ Now! Wow! That’s focus! But who is this and what is it. Ah! From the internet: “The flow state has been described by Csikszentmihalyi as the optimal experience in that one gets to a level of high gratification from the experience. Achieving this experience is considered to be personal and depends on the ability of the individual.”

“The creative trance can also occur when we appreciate art, become lost in a story we are reading, or in a performance we are watching.” I think of one such time when I had gone to see the movie Speed, the first time it was in the theater. Everyone gave such a big shout out of “Yes!” when Anthony Hopkins lost his head. He was the bad guy in the movie. He was also someone you could have empathy for in the end. I was a bit concern with being a part of a such big emotional response, where so many were so engrossed. I recall what it felt to be caught up in that movie. And yes, it was a trance like state, an intense focus.

The meaning of trance has new insights as I read this book. I am curious about my own creative process, and wish to be able to explain the experience. I am also interested in what other people experience. What to they sense, what do the feel at the time the are going into that creative zone. It becomes a fixation, even as if someone else is in control at times. The subconsciousness I think. The mind predicting possibilities. Yes I think so!

Tobi continues, “The archaic origins of trance are intimated in Paleolithic artifacts suggesting the existence of altered states through initiation symbolism and the ritualized rebirth of the self.” She continues with other excellent examples. I had not thought of such a thought when I had my art history classes. Now those images from my book float in my mind’s eye. Of course, trance states were a part of the art being carved into cave walls, rocks, etc. The creative process works in specific ways, we may modify it by personalizing it to who we are. But fundamentally the creative process, the mind’s predictive motivations from subconscious are there, we can alter them as we learn, yet we hang onto all experience so it can be applied.

Best wishes! Pejj