"In the second line of the Hebrew Bible, before light, before land, before anything with a respectable shape, the world is described as tohu v'bohu. Depending on the translation, this primordial state is rendered as "formless and void," "empty and waste," "invisible and unformed," or, more poetically, "chaos with a pulse." Which is to say: The universe began as a mess."
"Rollins pointed out something quietly radical about this word: It names a kind of productive nothingness. Not empty in the sense of barren, but empty in the sense of unclaimed. Like a blank canvas that looks useless until the first reckless brushstroke lands. This reframes creativity itself. We often imagine artists as people who pull brilliance out of thin air. But creation doesn't come from nothing. It comes from this strange middle state. A bubbling confusion. A cloud of half-thoughts. A mental junk drawer w"
The Hebrew phrase tohu v'bohu describes primordial chaos often translated as formless, empty, or unformed. That condition can be reframed as a productive, unclaimed space rather than mere garbage. The feeling experienced when facing a blank document resembles that formless state: confusion, half-ideas, and a messy beginning. Naming the phase tohu v'bohu transforms the emotional stance from failure to potential, turning the creator into a figure initiating a small genesis. Creativity arises not from absolute nothing but from a strange middle state of bubbling confusion and unruly possibility that invites first, reckless strokes.
Read at Psychology Today
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]