There are moments when life stops feeling flat.

A song reaches deeper than sound. A sunset feels like more than color. A beautiful act, a line of poetry, a work of art, a moment of love — and suddenly the soul remembers there is something higher.

In this episode of Thursday Journal: Notes from the Strange World, we explore God as muse: God as the source of awe, beauty, inspiration, and the upward pull that calls the unfinished human being beyond mere survival. With help from Marsilio Ficino and Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, this reflection looks at beauty as a ladder, the soul as something that can still be awakened, and the human being as a creature always in the process of becoming.