Living Love through The Practice of IMAGINATION

Imagine this: during the month of May, we will be exploring how to live love more deeply through The Practice of IMAGINATION.

The first thing we think of when we consider imagination is improvement. We want to go from an imperfect world that doesn't have enough of so many things – justice, peace, love – so we imagine a world that would have more of what's important to us. But improvement is not the only precious gift imagination offers.

Soul Matters suggests that "imagination doesn't just improve our lives, it populates it." It does that by providing us with accompaniment on our life journeys. Take, for example, that imaginary friend who kept you company when you were a child; do you still imagine that friend from time to time? Our imagination enables us to hear our ancestors' guidance, accompanying us when we are experiencing life's challenges.

Finally, imagination provides us with illumination. "Through the lens of imagination, every day experience becomes precious," says Soul Matters. "Sunshine on our face becomes a way that life expresses its love for us. The ocean is able to speak, telling us that we are freer and have more choices than we think. … [I]magination…enables us to hear the world speak." … It "gives the world a soul."

Those of us who have/had children in our lives know that most youngsters have particularly vivid imaginations. But the process of growing to maturity somehow winnows our perception of what's possible. "We think we understand the rules when we become adults," wrote famed visionary filmmaker David Lynch, "but what we really experience is a narrowing of the imagination."

That narrowing happens because of the limitations we learn from others as we are growing up. In his book, Where the Sidewalk Ends, American writer, cartoonist, songwriter, and musician Shel Silverstein warns against listening to all of the negative messages that limit our possibilities:

Listen to Mustn'ts, child, listen to the Don'ts.

Listen to the Shouldn'ts, the Impossibles, the Won'ts.

Listen to the Never Haves, then listen close to me.

      Anything can happen, child, Anything can be.

                 [emphasis added]

What did you want to grow up to be, once upon a time? A fireman, perhaps? A famous actor? An archeologist? When I saw Mary Martin fly on the first TV production of Peter Pan, I too wanted to fly, but I was told that that was not possible. "The moment you doubt you can fly," wrote Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie, "you cease forever to be able to do it," (The children in Barrie's famous story are able to fly by learning how to "think lovely thoughts"!)

Our lives become defined and limited when we listen too closely to the mustn'ts and the don'ts, and become convinced that flying is not an option. Consider this childhood memory of mine that resurfaced as I was reading about The Practice of Imagination. After having achieved the highest Mechanical Reasoning score in my entire 7th-grade class, my mother and the guidance counselor laughed about the suggestion that I become a mechanical engineer. In the late 1950s, no one imagined girls could have careers other than nursing and teaching, and then only as a preface to marrying and raising families. Today's girls no longer hear that limited messaging, and are instead encouraged to imagine an expansive future wherein anything is possible -- anything at all!

Alas, imagination can be used to produce both positive and negative results. "A waste, a corruption, of the imagination" is what American poet Ross Gay calls "the emotional and psychic burden we've laid on black and brown New Yorkers" because of the "gargantuan task not to imagine that everyone is imagining us as criminal." [emphasis added] "[R]ather than being cultivated for connection or friendship or love," he wrote, "[imagination] is employed simply for some crude version of survival."

We also can choose to engage with imagination in ways that will either empower or limit ourselves. Futurist and innovation expert Angela Oguntala writes, "You can either think that the world is getting better or that the future will be much better than it is now, or you can think that the world is getting worse." Beyond that distinction, however, the most important question we need to ask ourselves is: "Do you think you have agency in this world?" If the answer is "yes," then you can imagine a world that is getting better because you are using your imagination to make it so.

Imagination is what is ultimately required to rescue our beloved country from the hands of despots who are trying to destroy it. Simply saying, "Hands off this program!" is not enough. Imagining a country that works for everyone requires us to flip the narrative from negative to positive, proposing such things as "higher wages, lower costs, universal health care, and a government that actually works for the people," according to Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal.

"[E]very totalitarian regime is frightened of the artist," writes theologian Walter Brueggemann. "It is the vocation of the prophet to keep alive the ministry of imagination, to keep on conjuring and proposing alternative futures to the single one the king wants to urge as the only thinkable one." [emphasis added]

So how do you plan to use your imagination to make the world a better place? Rather than trying to answer that question by ourselves, we can work with like-minded souls in our beloved community, imagining a world where love is at the center.

Logic will get you from A to Z;

Imagination will get you everywhere.

– Albert Einstein

Seeking more inspiration and wisdom about The Practice of IMAGINATION? Check out this month’s Soul Matters Overview and the complete Ministry Guide for this theme.