CREATING IN THE DARK: TRUSTING THE INVISIBLE

As the days grow shorter and the light thins across the landscape, the natural world begins its annual retreat inward. The trees shed their leaves. The soil cools. The colors fade into bone and branch. This time of year reminds me that not all creative seasons are about producing. Some are about listening. Letting go. Trusting the invisible.

In many parts of the world, this season coincides with Thanksgiving—a tradition I don’t formally celebrate, but one I can relate to in spirit: the instinct to gather, to nourish, to fortify the inner life in the presence of others. There’s something beautiful about that—tending the soul while the world darkens and cools around us.

A road going through a winter forest at night with stars above symbolizing the creative journey, trusting the invisible.

THE FALLOW TIMES

There have been phases in my life where nothing outward seems to be happening.

No new commissions. No new artwork. No clear direction forward. My inspiration feels like it’s gone underground, and I’m left wondering if it will ever reappear.

I used to panic in these times—scrambling for projects, chasing activity, trying to outrun the stillness. But over the years, I’ve begun to see these lulls differently. Not as something to fix or avoid, but as an invitation.

An invitation to return to stillness.
To pause the grasping.
To allow space for composting.
For gestation.
For something new to emerge in its own time.

SILENCE AS TERRAIN

There have been chapters in my life when I was able to participate in extended periods of silent meditation—anywhere from one to nine weeks, often with a group of practitioners, though sometimes in solitude. These retreats are like conscious fallow phases. I let go of conversation, tasks, even eye contact. I drop beneath the surface of doing.

Over time, the superficial layers fall away. What remains is a direct orientation toward essence.
The silence becomes a kind of space-breath, a widening of inner terrain.

This space is renewing. Not because it’s empty, but because it clears away the noise.

White Rose painting by Yohanna Jessup, inspiration born from silence.

INSPIRATION THAT COMES QUIETLY

Some of my most meaningful paintings have emerged not in the active phases, but in silence.

The painting White Rose came to me this way. I had just completed four weeks of silent retreat at a center in Northern California. I was sitting in a logistics meeting—of all places—when an image appeared: a white rose, luminous and still, with the rising sun behind it.

It wasn’t loud. It didn’t shout.
It came from silence.
But it carried something immense.

The painting was infused with the essence of those weeks—of shared space, collective aspiration, stillness. It held not just the past, but a vision for the future: a gesture toward unity, tenderness, and the possibility of awakening in a time of division.

It took nearly a year for me to act on that vision. The voice was quiet—but insistent. And eventually, it became a painting.

LETTING GO OF THE PLAN

Not all inspiration arrives gracefully.

Years ago, I began a painting titled “Mountains In the Sky”—an attempt to capture a non-physical vision of mountains that I had touched in meditation. I was deeply moved by the experience. But what emerged on the panel felt lifeless, empty—nowhere near the brilliance of the vision.

I was frustrated. Disappointed. I wrapped the painting, swore I was done with art forever, and shoved it into storage.

Years passed.

Then one day, while settling into a new studio space, I found the forgotten panel. And to my surprise, I didn’t hate it. It wasn’t what I expected, but it wasn’t a failure either. I let it sit in the studio. A few weeks later, something shifted. The presence of Ganesha came through, and what followed was one of the most intimate, devotional painting processes I’ve ever experienced. What emerged is the painting “Sky Dance”.

That painting needed time.
I needed time.

DANCING IN THE DARK

There’s always a tension in the creative process:
Push too soon, and you risk breaking the energy.
Wait too long, and you may miss the moment.

As artists, we learn to listen for timing.
We learn when to row and when to drift.
When to press and when to rest.

There is no formula. No rulebook.
Only the presence of you, standing in the moment, alive and available to respond to what’s here.

TRUSTING THE INVISIBLE

If you’re in a phase where nothing seems to be moving, I invite you to trust the terrain.
Let the field rest.
Let the invisible do its work.

What looks like silence may be filled with preparation.
What looks like stillness may be gathering its strength.

“I want my own will, and I want simply to be with my will, as it goes toward action; and in those quiet, sometimes hardly moving times, when something is coming near, I want to be with those who know secret things or else alone.”

~ Rainer Maria Rilke, Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God