Muses and Creativity — one woman’s story
“O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend. The brightest heaven of invention, A kingdom for a stage…” William Shakespeare, Henry V
In Greek mythology, the term Muse refers to the nine daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, goddesses of creative inspiration.
Looking to science to better understand the rationale for muses, I give you Dopamine, not a goddess but the pleasure hormone. Dopamine is part of the brain’s reward system associated with wanting, motivation, focus and cravings. It is activated when we fall in love, and also boosts creativity.
I am a dopamine junkie as creativity triggers a large infusion. When I am in my creative flow, my brain is in full throttle reward ecstasy.
I am also a crush junkie. I’ve had intense infatuations since third grade with imaginative sexual fantasies. I wrote personalized erotica in middle school. I started writing stories in the second grade.
Rejection also activates dopamine, something writers and romantics experience more often than they’d like. Why breaking up is hard to do. Why we persevere. Why we have demons. Why we dance with the devil, as madness is also another dopamine booster. Pleasure/Pain… welcome to my brain on dopamine.
While these hormones bubble and boil, added to the brew is a sprig of endorphins, as I’m an athlete, and a dash of estrogen as I’m a woman. I am self-aware of the irrationality of the spell. I never free solo. I have a very stable “normal” married life that pulls me back to reality like a bungee cord.
My first true Muse was James*. Ten years my senior, he is a gay ivy league educated Upper East Side WASP intellectual with a dry wit whose drink of choice is an even drier martini. He was the publicist for the theatrical release of my first film.
After taking a ten-year hiatus from screenwriting to raise my children, the creative beast inside of me was famished. She started rattling her cage. “FEED ME.”
With fits and starts, I started writing again. It was daunting. Scary. My gremlins doubted I could complete a viable movie script. But eventually the story possessed me until, after several drafts, it was finished. Writing ‘The End’ was thrilling, exciting… daunting. Scary.
All my L.A. colleagues in the biz had moved up the ladder while I was driving carpools. I knew I had a good script, but I had no access to anyone that could produce it.
While raising the funds and then making the movie rivaled the most difficult of childbirths, the film landed me a licensing deal with Warner Brothers. We had a limited theatrical run and a big premiere party. We did festivals where audiences loved the film. Talk about beginner’s luck! A true dopamine Rave.
As the film neared the end of its run, I sat in my sales agent’s office and asked, “Does this mean I now have to return to driving carpools?” He answered stoically, “Yes.”
Like the worst cocaine comedown crash, my dopamine level plummeted. I had hoped my film’s success would bring calls from agents looking to represent me. But the calls never came. Back to sweeping up the embers.
James had teased me with a story that could only be shared when the film was done. About a month later, over lots of laughs, too many cocktails and not enough food, he told me of his freshly wounded broken heart from a man who was connected to someone in the film. The story empathetically resonated. I fall in love with people’s stories…
James and I had monthly meet ups in the city — my Cinderella nights. At that time, I lived in suburbia, and looked forward to our platonic dates when I no longer identified as a mother or a wife. We would drink, dine and talk intimately for hours. I crashed his life. Our outings would inspire a post dinner dopamine driven creative email. In between I would write emails inspired by an observation or experience. In early times, it was the art of letter writing.
We spoke about love. He pessimistically wondered whether true love existed. Out of our conversations came my next film, a romantic drama that was my philosophical dialogue on love. I cast his actor son in one of the roles.
We both arose from darkness. James met someone special and I was in a better place, so our dates became less often. Less intense. He and I remain close friends, still drink and dine and talk intimately for hours.
Enter Ryan*, my next muse, twenty years my junior, a mid-thirties talent manager in Los Angeles. Small in stature, he was a collegiate hockey attack man, a diehard Boston sports and alcohol fan.
It was after my third film which was a Redbox top comedy, had a Netflix release and an HBO deal. I got better at handling the post project dope drop, so onward.
The next script I wrote was episodic. Even though I earnestly tried after every production, I still didn’t have literary representation. With the pilot script, I finally succeeded! While not a literary agent, Ryan was close enough, a recently promoted talent manager willing to take a shot on me, and, of course, I was willing to take a shot on him. I had glorious fantasies of our success together.
I was a recently promoted empty-nester, and finally able to fully attempt to reclaim my spot in Hollywood. Instead of yearning for a Cinderella night, my dopamine brain craved more. So instead of runaway nights in the city, I took runaway trips to Los Angeles.
On one visit Ryan shared a freshly wounded broken-hearted love story…. It empathetically resonated. I fall in love with people’s stories… Ryan and I would have bimonthly meet ups in Los Angeles. I looked forward to our platonic dates when I no longer identified as a mother or a wife. We would drink, dine, and talk intimately for hours. I crashed his life. We spoke about love. Battered by a divorce followed quickly by a lost soulmate, he pessimistically wondered whether he would ever find love again.
My trips West inspired a dopamine driven creative email written on the flight home. In between trips, I wrote emails inspired by an observation or experience. In early times, it was the art of letter writing… Sound familiar?
And then he told me he loved me in the deepest, sincerest most platonic of ways that rocked me to the core.
“Happy is she whom the muses love. Sweet flows speech from her lips…” wrote the Greek Poet Hesiod
As a professional writer, I was my most prolific during these five plus years. From our sometimes fraught, sometimes volatile relationship came my latest film, another love story. This one celebrates friend love. I cast his daughters and his actress second wife, as he too found love.
Our connection was more intense and longer than James’ driven not only by dopamine, but by the other flammable hormone — that last hot surge of estrogen that happens during peri-menopause, along with his roller coaster of emotions that fuel’s dopamine. You can take the hockey player off the ice, but not the attack out of the man.
Writes Rachel Witte, in her article The Muse Throughout Art History “While the term muse is often seen as a good thing, the person depicted in the art does not necessarily have to have a positive impact on the artist. They serve as a momentous force from which the artist draws inspiration, good or bad; chaotic or peaceful. “
Ryan’s wife read my emails and then he instantly shape-shifted me from artist to siren.
My lyrical words were suddenly perceived as dangerous. Like Odysseus’ men, he plugged his ears with wax, and like Jason’s musician, overpowered me with louder vitriol. On the salty surf, we danced a death tango that ultimately smashed us both into the rocks, drowned me and destroyed our special bond that Ryan was once very proud of. It was excruciatingly painful to be say good-bye to the muse I once deified, but I am an artist, not a siren
It’s been a tough recovery. My broken hearted love story. I hold a special place in my heart for my muses and grateful to have many mini ones in my life who have healed and continue to inspire me. My creative beast needs to eat. From a flicker comes a flame.
*name changed
