SHOWERED WITH INSPIRATION

by W.L. Elliott

Why does Inspiration choose the most inconvenient possible time to strike? Really? Is there a Muse of Literature sitting around just waiting until I’m up to my elbows in either dish soap suds or shampoo?

“Oh, she’s going to just love this idea for the road-show,” I can hear her say from Mount Olympus, “but she can’t have it yet, no. No, not just yet. Wait….. wait for it…. Ha-HA!! She’s in the shower!”

BLAM!

“Good shot, old girl!” Ares, the god of war, congratulates on his way past. “Right in the head!”

“Why, thank you, I’ve been practicing!” She bats her eyelashes.

“Oh, and it shows! Shall we have tea?”

…and they stroll off arm in arm, leaving me wet and dripping, wrapped in a towel, scrounging for a pen and paper—knowing all the while that when I look at it later, that same paper will be so wrinkled and covered with blue smudges that I’ll have to decipher the writing like ancient Greek!

OOH!

All I can say is it’s a good think I’m not ancient Greek! The Greeks believed in gods that were vengeful, mean, and ornery - not at all like our Heavenly Father – and I really can’t see the Holy Ghost hanging around my bathroom just for the kick of inconveniencing me.

If you think about it, you’ll know exactly why you get really great ideas at times like that. For me, my mind is free when I’m doing dishes or in the shower – there’s nothing to really think about, and I can just let my mind be quiet while my body does other things. When one’s mind is quiet, the Still Small Voice doesn’t just bring testimony of the Book of Mormon and warnings of earth-shattering importance, though I have experienced and am truly grateful for both of those. He also brings good thoughts and virtuous ideas.

Philippians 4: 8
“…whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”

Isn’t it amazing that the scriptures can shed such light, even on something as mundane and worldly as the task of writing a book? “Think” is the operative word for us. Give yourself time while you’re in your writing mode to let your mind be quiet, to let yourself hear those really great ideas the Spirit can lend you.

If you can do that, then he won’t have to resort to smacking you in the head while you’re unawares—in the shower!