Creativity - an Itellectual or spiritual process?

I have just read something that has cheered me up no end. It is a realization that could hopefully be the first step in the breaking of my writers block.

I have just started to read a book called "Walking in This World - Practical Strategies for Creativity" by Julia Cameron (Page 6, paragraph 2, line 3).

The sentence that has caused this realization within me reads "....creativity is a spiritual rather than an intellectual endeavor!" (Page 6, paragraph 2, line 3).

This has to be true, when you think about it, because when you are being creative, you are using and engaging your intuitive nature, not your intellect. A creative act is one that is more spiritual than intellectual. Any kind of analytical study or adopting of hard and fast rules to a creative act makes it formulaic and full of complicated theory. In that sense painting a picture or composing music is not formulaic as mathematics is. Maths does come into these things in some ways (musical tempo, chord intervals etc) but songwriters like George Michael and Peter Gabriel have stated in articles that they compose much better songs, when they follow instinct instead of blindly following music theory. What sounds, looks or feels right is always going to have more artistic value to the creator than something that is created using a formula. There are, of course, the rules of harmony and some chord sequences that are used repeatedly, but these rules are used much more loosely by rock musicians than classical musicians. The best artists/composers are actually those who have the vision and talent to know how to break the rules convincingly, without anyone knowing about it or spotting it.

This shouldn't have been such a revelation to me, but it seems so obvious now. It has been a real epiphany for me to suddenly realize and understand this fact. Like a sudden "seeing of the light", as it were.

Many intellectual people are not very creative because their minds are restricted by facts, knowledge and theories. Intellectuals are theorists who follow scientific theories and factual processes that cannot be changed or altered. 2 + 2 = 4. 2+2 can only = 4. If you give ten mathematicians a mathematical problem, they will all come to exactly the same answer (assuming they all get the correct answer). Whereas, if you ask ten artists to draw the same house they will all paint a slightly different picture. Truly creative people are more "free-thinkers" whose minds are free to imagine what COULD be POSSIBLE whether or not it actually IS POSSIBLE. If you ask ten songwriters to write a song called "The Power Of Love", for example, they will all write ten totally different songs.

I have always thought, when I have seen a great painting or heard a great song, that it comes from some sort of cleverness of the intellect. However, it seems to me that it has much more to do with cleverness in the sense of knowing how to utilise and use your intuitive gut feelings to create something without engaging (too much) conscious thought.

I think I have said enough. My head hurts now.

I THINK this makes sense to me.