What a Japanese jazz anime and a Corsican feast taught me about creative trust

What if creativity didn’t need certainty — just a willingness to share?

Have you ever felt like your words or projects weren’t ready to be shared? Like you needed more clarity, more certainty — something more — before putting them out into the world? Maybe you’ve started writing something down — an idea, a story, a dream project — but hesitated before sharing it, convinced it wasn’t quite there yet. I know that feeling all too well.

I spent months last year questioning my path, looking for external validation, waiting for my ideas to feel "ready." But life does not offer perfect timing. Clarity comes not before action, but through it.

This realization was not immediate but looking back through my journal pages, I see now that March last year was the beginning of something — like seeds just starting to break through the soil. Everything that happened that month led me to where I am now. As spring was about to start, this was the moment I first began to listen to my inner artist and trust my gifts.

And it all started on a Monday afternoon in a nearly empty movie theater.

A lesson about creativity and trust

At the time, I had been working through The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, facing my own creative blocks and re-reading the morning pages I had filled since January, trying to find clarity. I had been searching for a reason to launch Sip of Corsica and start writing — really writing — but I kept hesitating. The fear of not being ready was stronger than the pull to begin. Maybe you know that feeling too.

One of the exercises in The Artist’s Way is the ‘Artist’s Date’ — an intentional solo experience meant to rekindle creativity. A few days before the Spring Equinox last year, I had taken myself on what turned out to be my truest ‘Artist’s Date’ so far — a solo trip to a nearly empty movie theater to watch a Japanese anime about jazz called Blue Giant.

What drove me to that movie theater in the middle of a Monday afternoon? A series of synchronicities: a movie poster I spotted while walking my daughter to school that sparked my curiosity because of my long-standing love for jazz and saxophone; an announcement that the electricity in our area would be cut for repairs that same Monday, leaving me with an unexpected free day; no client meetings scheduled, making it easy to step away from work and choose play instead. On a whim, I decided to listen to Julia Cameron’s voice in my head and just go for it. Though I have to admit, I briefly questioned my choice when I realized in the opening minutes that Blue Giant was not only an animated movie inspired by a manga, but also entirely in Japanese!

However, as soon as the first notes began to rise, I knew I was meant to be there.

The film follows three young musicians chasing their dream of making it in the jazz world, each representing a different approach to creativity: Dai Miyamoto, the saxophonist, plays with raw, uncontainable passion, translating his emotions into sound. Pianist Yukinori Sawabe, raised in a family of musicians, believes in precision and technique. And then there’s Shunji Tamada, a drummer with little experience but a beginner’s enthusiasm so pure that it drives him forward despite his inexperience.

Basking in the amazing soundtrack, I sat in the dark, watching these three characters clash, learn, and push each other beyond their individual limits. It wasn’t just about jazz — it was about what it means to create, to trust in your own way of expressing something, even when it feels uncertain.

And isn’t that what creativity asks of us?

Some of us, like Dai, create with instinct and fire, pouring our emotions into every note. Others, like Yukinori, refine and shape their craft, seeking technical mastery before feeling ready to share. And some, like Shunji, simply say yes — stepping forward with nothing but the joy of creating, trusting that they’ll learn as they go.

That tension — between raw emotion, practiced skill, and the courage to begin anyway — mirrored my own struggles with writing. But seeing it on screen made me realize something else.

Because that day, in the theater, I didn’t just watch a movie with a great soundtrack — I felt the physical urgency of creativity itself. The fiery solos burned across the screen, the rhythms pulsed through my chest, the musicians became their instruments. I realized that creation wasn’t something to be controlled — it was something to be lived.

Sitting in that nearly empty movie theater, something shifted. That’s probably the reason I found myself crying my eyes out in the dark, without being able to explain it. It was as if something unlocked at that moment and helped me face my fears.

The power of collective expression

Only a few days after that moment in the dark theater, where I felt creativity as something raw and urgent, I found myself standing in a packed church in Bastia to celebrate St Joseph, one of the patron saints of the city.

Statue of St. Joseph during the celebration in Bastia, March 19, 2024 - Copyright: Maïlys Ray, the author.

If I remember this moment so well, it’s not so much because it was my first time attending this event, but because the experience stayed with me far longer than I expected.

During the celebration, I experienced another kind of music — one not driven by fiery solos but by the harmony of voices blending into something larger than themselves. Just like in jazz, where musicians push each other, adapt, and create in the moment, Corsican polyphonic singing is built on the interplay of voices — each singer taking his place in the collective sound. It isn’t about singing alone, but about listening, adapting, and finding where your voice belongs. At first, it may not be perfect but soon the harmony emerges, and for anyone listening that’s when the magic happens.

Here’s a short recording from that moment — one that captures the blending of voices in harmony. Listen to how they intertwine, each voice finding its place in the whole.

This celebration had an impact beyond the music itself. During the mass, Cardinal Bustillo spoke of Joseph the carpenter — not just as a saint, but as a symbol of inner freedom, of refusing to let fear hold us back, of the responsibility to use our gifts wisely. I listened to those words, not realizing yet that they were meant for me as they echoed what I had been struggling with and what emerged too from Blue Giant.

I didn’t fully realize it at the moment, but these two experiences, in the movie theater and in the church, were teaching me the same lesson about creative trust.

At first, these two moments seemed so different — one, a wild, emotional expression of jazz; the other, a reverent and collective harmony. But looking back, I realize they weren’t opposites at all. They were actually two sides of the same creative trust: the willingness to express without overthinking and the courage to trust your gifts and to blend your voice into something greater. Both jazz and Corsican polyphony require stepping forward, offering what you have, and trusting that it will find its place to move the audience listening to you.

And perhaps that’s what St. Joseph’s celebration, the jazz players in Blue Giant, and Corsican polyphonic songs all remind us: that creation isn’t meant to be held back in solitude — it’s meant to be shared.

Any time you hold back your gifts because you’re afraid to sound imperfect, you’re misusing them. Like in polyphony or jazz, each gift, each “voice” matters — but only when it dares to take its place in the harmony and to be offered to others, even in its imperfect, evolving form.

So I’ll ask you: What creative gift have you been waiting to share? What’s something you’ve been holding back, thinking it’s not quite ready?

Let’s talk about it. I’d love to hear your thoughts — whether in the comments, in a reply, or even as a reflection of your own. Maybe, together, we can take that first step toward trusting the offering.