Self-Forgetfulness and Creativity

Glimpses of Wisdom in the Writings of John Keats

Many of the ideas of the poet, John Keats, are similar to the teachings of Adhyatma Yoga and those found in the Bhagavad Gita. He thought of the world as a school into which intelligences are born and have to develop into fully fledged souls. In these intelligences there is a divine spark, God. His God is not exclusive to any one religion, but a God in no way limited by man’s intelligence. To become a fully grown soul, for Keats, is to put aside the ego-consciousness, the sense of identity with what he called Flora and Old Pan, the life of the senses, and to live the life of intuitive guidance born of the divine spark within; to comprehend the mystery of life, living it consciously, spontaneously. In his first long poem, Sleep and Poetry, he wrote:

...there ever rolls
A vast idea before me, and I glean
Therefrom my liberty; thence too I’ve seen
The end and aim of Poesy.