Suleika Jaouad

And the germ risk was too high as someone who had no immune system.

And so every day I would text him one of my paintings.

And in return, he started composing these little lullabies that he would send to me every day.

And I would play them on loop in my hospital room as a kind of...

counterpoint to the hospital's many noises, the beeping IV poles, the alarms that go off whenever your condition drastically changes.

And I felt so enveloped by his presence, by his love, but also by the healing melody of the lullaby, which is

you know, perhaps the most soothing musical form.

Kind of primal.

Primal, absolutely.

And, you know, maybe it seems like a silly thing, but it changed my entire experience of that stay.

I was no longer afraid of...

My dreams and my nightmares, they became a subject, something interesting and even beautiful when I translated them into watercolor.

And that to me is the power of the creative process.

You can...

alchemize something that feels painful or difficult into something where you begin to also find moments of beauty or interest or unexpected revelations even.

I've always been fascinated by alchemy, and I think traditionally we think of it as this magical process of transforming something considered worthless like lead into something precious like gold.

And that, to me, has such a rhyme with how I experience the creative process, whether

You're someone who doesn't consider yourself creative or you're a musician by profession or a visual artist.

The ability to make something where there was nothing has always felt miraculous to me.

The ability, even in the privacy of a journal, to take a swirl or mess of feelings that you're having and to distill them on the page has always...