Imagine our mind as a canvas and imagination as the colorful stroke of a paintbrush that creates mental imagery of thoughts, concepts, and ideas to influence how we perceive the world. We can use this faucet of our mind to connect with our imaginary friends or talking stuffed animals. Or we can experience things that do not exist in reality, like dinosaur adventures, superhero powers, and professional roles like ‘doctor.’ Our capacity to create LEGO skyscrapers, living room forts, and finger-painting works of art is endless.
We can refine our imaginations and use them in our artistic expression, visualization of positive outcomes, and goal setting. Our imaginations also help us develop innovative businesses and constructive solutions to problems. They allow us to step into another’s shoes by imagining their struggles, resulting in feelings of understanding and compassion. Our imaginations can be the gateway to boundless creativity, enabling us to paint the canvas of our minds with vibrant strokes that shape our lives and inspire innovation, empathy, and a myriad of possibilities in the tapestry of human experience. But if left unmanaged, our imaginative minds have the potential to spin into dark strokes, creating images of suffering and destruction.
Giving our minds space to wander freely, create mental scenarios, and explore thoughts without a specific purpose is essential for our well-being and growth as a species. However, at some point, our minds will likely wish to explore the other side of imagination, where shadows resemble ghosts and images of worst-case scenarios fill our minds. This aspect of our imaginations is destructive rather than constructive. It is where the sun explodes, and asteroids hit Earth to end human life. Here, bad guys break into our houses while we sleep, or worse yet, our moms never return home from the grocery store. Refining this side of our imaginations can lead to the creation of unfounded gossip, deceptive narratives, and scenarios of revenge. This realm creates images of limiting beliefs, judgments, negative self-talk, unlikely scenarios, and fearful outcomes. The destructive side of our imaginations can get carried away and generate images of unrealistic expectations because it imagines all that is wrong with us and our lives.
We need both sides of our imaginations- even the darker side- for the growth and evolvement of our species. Our constructive side moved humans out of caves and into houses with electricity, hot water, and refrigerators. It continues to help us find creative solutions for the betterment of our world. The destructive side of our imaginations helped us anticipate potential dangers- like sabor tooth tigers- so humans could continue to survive and evolve. We continue to rely on this aspect of our imaginations to prepare us for future obstacles and avoid dangerous outcomes as much as possible. However, we may need to intentionally direct our consciousness away from the dark side of our imaginations when there are no perceivable dangers. Then, our minds can focus on constructive creations that help shape how our consciousness engages with our external world.
Imagine Consciousness
Imagine consciousness as a bright, energetic ball of light inside of us. Whatever it shines its light on is brought into our awareness. Without consciousness, we would not exist because there would be no light to shine on existence itself. This ball of light can visit different realms of our inner and outer worlds, such as our sensations, thoughts, and surroundings. Consciousness can visit and interact with our imaginations and shine its light on the mental images and thoughts we construct in our minds. The exchanges between our imagination and consciousness shape our perceptions, beliefs, knowledge, and experiences of ourselves and the world. For instance, our dog, Mae, began barking at her reflection in the window one evening and startled our son, Leo. We explained what a reflection is and told Leo that this was why Mae barked. Now, whenever Mae barks, Leo says, ‘reflection’ because he imagines that Mae saw herself in the window, which caused her to bark.
If Leo’s imagination were to get carried away, it could construct fictitious images of how Mae’s reflection is dangerous and, worse yet, could come to life. He may imagine our family is in danger. These fearful images may cause him to stay up all night and protect us from Mae’s reflection if it comes to life and tries to harm us. As his imagination gets carried away, Leo gets further away from the simple explanation of a reflection causing Mae’s barking. When we believe in our imaginary scenarios, they distort our perceptions of reality. If we aren’t careful, these colorful images in our minds may create more harm than good and negatively affect how we experience our lives.
Where Do You Shine Your Light of Consciousness?
As discussed last week, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. reminded us, “Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” How we use our minds and where we direct the attention of our consciousness affects our lives and those who are a part of our shared reality. We first need to notice when and where we shine our light of consciousness. Do we spend time on the dark side of our imaginations or the vibrant side of possibilities?
Here are some examples of how living in our destructive imaginations can affect our outer experience of reality.
- Our imaginations create unachievable mental images of ourselves that don’t exist. We strive to be more, do more, and have more to live up to our imaginary expectations. Believing we should be ‘more’ or different gets in the way of loving and appreciating ourselves now.
- We imagine the negative opinions and judgments others have or could have about us. These images lead to social anxiety and isolation rather than to connection and meaningful relationships. Imagining being judged by others prevents us from trying new things. We also may withhold from sharing our ideas and creations with the world.
- Our imaginations create images of situations we would never survive, like the death of a loved one or heartache. To protect ourselves from these imagined experiences, we withhold love and don’t allow ourselves to get ‘too close’ to others.
- We hold back from exploring new endeavors in fear of all the imaginary worst-case scenarios leading to embarrassment, failure, shame, or worse yet, feeling like something is wrong with us. These images cause us to put aside our goals or hold back from going after what we want- like hosting a wellness retreat or changing jobs.
- Our imaginations construct pictures of how the world should be, how others should behave, and what we need to be happy. This imaginary world does not exist. Yet, we believe it should, which leads us to be dissatisfied, unfulfilled, discontent, and angry with our lives. We become victims of our lives because they fail to live up to the imaginative world in our heads. We feel resistant and ungrateful rather than excited and empowered by our outer reality.
Here are some examples of how living in our constructive imaginations can affect our outer experience of reality.
- We use our imaginations to imagine attainable versions of ourselves we want to become because we love ourselves and our lives. We imagine the choices that this version of ourselves would make and do them now– things like sleeping more, drinking less, moving our bodies, and speaking kinder words to ourselves.
- When someone is unkind to us, we use our imaginations to picture why they are suffering. For instance, maybe their dog is sick. Then, we can act from a place of love, compassion, and empathy rather than anger and judgment. ** We will never know why some people are rude to us. So why not imagine a scenario that makes us feel love rather than anger?
- We use our imaginations to remember loved ones who have passed and continue to feel connected to them. We imagine our inner strength to help us survive heartache. If we imagine a place within us that is pure strength and love, we can learn to appreciate and respect even the difficult experiences. We feel love for ourselves and others because we can access this sense of strength and connection anytime by turning inward.
- Our imaginations explore how we can contribute our interests, talents, creations, or qualities to the world. We picture how we can use these things to help ourselves grow along the way while helping the lives of others- even if it is just one person. Then, we are more likely to put our creations out into the world rather than hold ourselves back in fear of being rejected. And even if we get rejected, we can imagine all the people who may like what we offer. So we stay on course in search of those people.
- We use our imaginations to explore all possibilities. Both desirable and undesirable outcomes. Then, we can imagine how we would solve the undesirable outcomes if they occurred. This process will help us discover that we can handle any situation- even our worst-case scenarios. With a new sense of confidence, we do the thing rather than let our fear hold us back. We go after a new job, start our own business, have a child, or start a blog.
- Our imaginations can remind us of all that is going right and all we already have in our lives. Everyone and everything is how it’s supposed to be. Our imaginations can help us reflect on all the billions of moments in our lives that got us to this moment right here. The can remind us of the miracle of life and how being here is truly phenomenal. Nothing needs to change at this moment. We have enough. We are enough.
- We can imagine getting to the last day of our lives and asking this version of us what we can do so that we have no regrets when we arrive at this moment. Maybe this version of us tells us to be more honest and loving towards our family and friends. Or to stop engaging in harmful behaviors. One day, we will reach that final day and be that version of ourselves. So why not listen to what they have to say and follow their advice now.
How Do You WANT To Shine Your Light of Consciousness?
We all have agency over how we wish to direct our consciousness. The choice of how we shine the attention of our consciousness contributes to the fate of our shared experience. Like King, we can use our imaginative minds for the betterment of humanity. We can focus on images to help us become who we ‘ought to be.’ Or we can persist in living in the separation and often painful images within our minds. The power lies within us to direct our consciousness to our vibrant imaginations and, in turn, influence our shared reality.
Put The Practice Into Practice
Next week, we will discuss the states of consciousness, but for now, let’s increase our awareness of how we use our imaginative minds. You can ask yourself, “Where am I?” when you notice yourself absorbed in thoughts and mental images. Are you on the dark side or lighter side of your imagination? Then, ask yourself, “Do I want to be here?” If not, then notice how you can refine your imagination to generate a different image of the same scenerio that is more constructive rather than destructive. Finally, come back to reality and notice how you feel differently when you change the creations in your head to better align with how you wish to live your life.
