I’ve been a Bob Dylan fan since I was 16. That was also when I decided I was going to be Bob Dylan (or at least the “next” Bob Dylan). I taught myself guitar and harmonica, started writing songs and poetry, and even played some local shows. But there was one glaring problem: I didn’t have Dylan’s talent—not even close.

My rhymes were hard to find and my melodies derivative. Still, I tried. Like a thousand other dreamers with scruffy hair and secondhand guitars, I chased the muse that seemed to live permanently on Dylan’s shoulder. But no matter how hard I tried, she refused to visit mine.

Fast forward to the present, and Dylan’s muse is back in the spotlight. The Christmas release of the biopic A Complete Unknown has everyone buzzing about this almost-84-year-old icon. Gen Z is even adding his songs to their playlists, thanks in part to Timothée Chalamet’s portrayal of Dylan. (Yes, apparently Chalamet is a gateway drug to greatness now.)

For six decades, Dylan has been hailed as everything from a prophet to the Shakespeare of his generation. His trophy case looks like something you’d find at a cultural Hall of Fame:

• 11 Grammys
• A Golden Globe
• An Academy Award
• A Pulitzer Prize
• The Presidential Medal of Freedom
• Oh—and the Nobel Prize in Literature (because why not?)

When the Pulitzer folks praised him, they noted his “extraordinary poetic power.” The Nobel committee said he created “new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.” Meanwhile, I’m over here trying to find a rhyme for “orange.”

I don’t know how I got to write those songs.

In A Complete Unknown, director James Mangold includes this line attributed to Dylan:

You know, people ask where the songs come from, but they don’t really want to know where the songs come from. They want to know why the songs didn’t come to them.

Ouch. That one hit me right in the ego. I know exactly what it feels like to wish the songs had come to me—to stare at a blank page and wonder if the muse got lost on the way to my house.

Dylan famously said it took him just 10 minutes to write “Blowin’ in the Wind.” Ten minutes! I’ve spent longer deciding what kind of sandwich to make. And yet, this protest song-turned-anthem changed the world. So where did those songs come from?

In a 2004 interview with 60 Minutes, Dylan told Ed Bradley, “I don’t know how I got to write those songs. Those early songs were like almost magically written.”

Magically? Maybe. But recently, I stumbled across another explanation.

Just before the release of A Complete Unknown, Duluth’s public radio station aired an interview with Louis Kemp, Dylan’s lifelong friend. Kemp met the then-Bobby Zimmerman at Jewish summer camp when Dylan was 12 and Kemp was 11, and the two have been close ever since. Near the end of the interview, Kemp offered this insight:

He knows what he has is a gift from God, and he’s the conduit. He doesn’t feel that he should be taking the credit for it. He feels that the credit should go to God—that he’s been blessed.

Commenting on being called a prophet and the voice of a generation, Kemp says that Dylan didn’t take any of that seriously and “poo-poohed” it all. Kemp continued, “Luck is a random occurrence,” he said. “When something good happens to you, if you have that understanding and connection, it’s a direct blessing from God. His gift is a direct blessing from God. He knows that.”

Creativity, at its best, isn’t about us. It’s about what flows through us.

Hearing Kemp changed the way I think about creativity. For years, I saw Dylan’s talent as a wall I couldn’t climb. Now, I see it as a window—a glimpse into something bigger than all of us.

Creativity, at its best, isn’t about us. It’s about what flows through us. Whether we call it magic, luck, or inspiration, the truth is that every brushstroke, lyric, or line of code we create is a reflection of something divine. And while we might not all have Dylan’s gift, we’re all blessed with the ability to create in our own way.

So, no, the songs didn’t come to me. But maybe that’s okay, because the God who gave Dylan his creative impulse also gave me mine. And God gave you yours, too.

In one of his stories, Jesus said that it’s not about how many talents or gifts you’ve got but what you do with them. Whether your talent feels earth-shaking or is just a quiet nudge, his instruction is simple: Take what you’ve been given and put it to work. And hey, giving God some credit for the whole “gift” thing? That’s always a good idea.