Imagination Is Our Most Powerful Tool.
Have you ever been caught in a powerful daydream? Where your body was there but your mind wasn’t? Personally, I often find this happening to me either when I’m driving or in the shower. Typically, the trigger that will rip me out of my own personal genjutsu* (illusion technique)—at least, when I’m driving, that is—is my father yelling in my ear, “Pay attention! You’re spacing out of this world!”
Having built my entire career and a lot of what I do personally off of creativity, I can whole-heartedly attest to this: imagination is a powerful tool; if not, our most powerful tool. Sure, some people perceive playing in imagination as simply “living in your own head” (which it ultimately is), but this “far out”-ness can actually be both harnessed and (ultimately) strengthened to wield how you want it.
Granted, despite all of the merits to imagination, imagination can also bring you down some very dark and disturbing paths. For me, imagination will often lead me to a solution (though, this wasn’t—and still isn’t—always the case). Going over a problem repeatedly in my own head allows me to figure out my way around it. Think of it like Lives in a video game… you have an infinite number of Lives to keep chipping away at a problem until you’ve figured out your way around it. In life, we only (presumably) have one Life. However, in our mind’s eye (just like in a video game) we have an infinite number of Lives at our disposal.
Contrary to this positive utilization of our imagination, our imagination can also bring us down some very dark and disturbing paths. If you’re able to separate your deluded (illusionary, or mental) self, that’s one thing—you can still pull yourself out of your own imagination when things go awry—but what if you have a hard time realizing you’re “in” a genjutu in the first place? That is exactly why people have “bad-trips” to begin with. They start thinking about one negative idea, which spirals into another, which spirals into another, then another, then another, then another, until you’re left looming over your own life choices. *PAY ATTENTION! YOU’RE SPACING OUT OF THIS WORLD!* That was then and this is now… you always have the potential and opportunity to change what you are currently doing and (in effect) your future and life choices for the better!
“There’s a stark difference between a lion chasing you in your mind and a lion chasing you in real life.”
Imagination, like a drug (which ultimately stimulates your imagination), is neither good nor bad (Hello, Nietzsche). It is just a tool or an instrument to help you manifest what it is that you are already feeling inside.
So, master your imagination (master your mind) to master your life—because your entire life is an imagination that you can choose to either navigate through or be navigated by. So, ask yourself this: who, exactly, is ruling whom?
-imagine wisely.