Years ago, I read a book that animated and forever changed my creative process.

In The Mind of the Maker, Dorothy Sayers says, “It is a universal experience that a work of art has no existence apart from its translation into material form.”

That is, people think a painting doesn’t exist before it’s painted, a sculpture before it’s sculpted, or a story before it’s written.

But Sayers went on to posit that a work of art, let’s say a story, not only lives in our minds before we write it, but exists before that first thought inspires us.

Her unconventional idea moved me to envision a celestial dome, a ceiling resplendent with a riotous swath of lustrous stars splashed across a blue so deep and dark you could lose yourself in the magnificence. I imagined the arched archive housing my creation, glimmering outside my experience of time and space.

With my story orbiting in that space, all I need to do is inch my way toward an entity that already exists. As words pour out of my soul and the piece emerges, it’s as if I’ve ascended into the vault and embraced my creation. And if I wind up deliberating over every word, that’s fine, too. Either way, I feel less anxiety during the process.

I’m driven to finish most tasks as quickly as possible. My fiction projects, though, may linger in limbo for years. The concept of a vault helps me relax as I wait for the rest of the tale to emerge.  The waiting is never static. New experiences and discoveries inform and change me—often providing what I need to complete a story. Rather than force myself to churn out a product, I allow myself space to be attentive and expectant.

As a writer, I’ve struggled with self-doubt. Early on, I’d ask, “Can I even call myself a writer?” Mid-career, I’d admit to being a writer, but question whether I was successful. Now, I wonder if I was successful enough. But, when I remember to view my writing as a calling and see myself as receiving a story that I’ve somehow already created, my doubts dissipate.

This perspective enables me to risk multiple failures at the start of a creative venture. I’m more likely to fling myself into the process, to explore a new style, a new genre. This has led me to write poetry, young adult fiction, audiobooks and iBooks.

Quantum physicists might not think the idea of a celestial vault so strange. Many believe that the past, present and future happen all at once.

To help us understand that concept, Brian Randolph Greene, professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University and co-founder of the World Science Festival, suggests we picture a giant loaf of bread, each slice a life parallel to the other slices, all part of the same loaf, all lives happening at the same time. Past and future are merely perspectives, different slices of that long loaf.

What if we creatives were to think of time as a long loaf of bread, each slice a bit of glittering eternity? Furthermore, what if we were to envision a celestial vault arching over slices of that loaf, a personal, heavenly shelter for all our creations, past, present and future?

One can poke holes in the idea of a celestial vault. We know all that glitters is not gold. There is no guarantee that the world will consider my completed creation as brilliant or to even have merit.

So what?

Perfection isn’t the point. This way of thinking is an invitation to a life of joyful creation. Ms. Sayers might be rolling in her grave at the liberties I’ve taken with her book, but I’d have to say, it works for me.