IMAGINATION
Give imagination free rein in your life. Explore its images and ponder its meaning-making moments, and it will always present you with something new to be seen, felt, or made known.
Reading the Sacred in Everyday Life" by Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat
What do we mean when we talk about imagination? If I try to really think about the WORD, I find that it is one of those things that I think I know when I do it, or when I am with someone who is doing it, or even when I encounter the art, music, literature, dance, or drama of someone who has done it. Imagining is not the same as perceiving, believing, remembering, desiring, anticipating, conceiving or supposing. All of those occupations of the mind put some sort of constraint or expectation upon the focus of the activity. Imagining, it seems to me, does not require that anything at all come of it. It is what happens when I take the brakes and the filters and the governors off the meanderings of my mind, and simply let it wander where it will.
So does the admonishment to "give imagination free rein in your life" amount to a redundancy? If I give my mind free rein, do I necessarily need to give the resultant imaginings free rein in my life? Would it be good if I did? My imaginings are not always good or sweet or happy. My imaginings can be dark, destructive, ugly. The young woman who once dreamed big dreams of a wonderful world waiting to come into being got the snot kicked out of her along the long, long road to this point. I am not entirely convinced that turning my demons lose in the "real" world would be a manageable undertaking. Not safe. If I were to spend more time than I already do exploring the meanings behind my imaginings; pondering the possibilities -- I wonder if I could survive it.
Maybe this one isn't meant for jaded, beat-up, old shells like me. Maybe it looks toward the young and the fresh and the innocent. I imagine it might be best to leave the imagining to them.
swan
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ReplyDeleteI read this the other day, and had a bunch of different thoughts that went all different ways and didn't comment at all. So now I've come back to it.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that lots of people live their sexual lives, their emotional lives, in very constrained and limited patterns. I don't think you've done that. So imagination already has played a role.
You talk about darkness, that your imaginings can be dark, destructive and ugly. I'm not sure if you mean darker fantasies. Mine often tend to be darker than I'd want to really experience.
Or maybe you mean your anger. And I get that too. It seems to get in the way of lots of things for me at this point. I could write more about that, but then, could I stop?
Years ago I did some reading on how to get your creativity moving in different ways. I think we are happier when we are creative, and that alone might be a reason to try it. Creativity and imagination don't necessarily have to happen in in linear ways, in fact switching media can sometimes help to spark something new. Try something visual, painting or photography if you are trying to jump start something word based, or the other way round.
-sin
Hi sin...
ReplyDeleteI appreciate the reach out at this moment. I don't know what to do with my imaginings, and I doubt very much that trying to be more creative will lead me out of the darkness. I have come to understand that, many years ago, I made the decision to come into this relationship; made decisions about staying in this relationship; made decisions about what I would and would not tolerate any longer within the context of this relationship -- and I understand that all of those decision points have led to this place. I am 57... nearing 58, and I also understand that there are no do overs for me. This is it. I'm not young and perky anymore, and I have no more faith in my dreams. So, the imaginings these days are about living out the next years in a dull, lifeless, hopeless mire of broken dreams and disappointments (since I have not the courage to take a handful of pills and go quietly to sleep). The rest lies, with the silver bracelet I once gave Him, in the mud at the bottom of the pond out back of the house.
Thanks for caring...
swan