The Hall of Awesomeness

Recently I set my policy students the task of picking five ways of thinking to structure an ill-defined policy. One of those ways I chose was the ‘picturing’ technique which visualises a problem and it’s relationships. In essence, nobody really picked that option out of 38 students. In a more recent event I asked one of my students to think systemically about a problem. She said she couldn’t do it because it took her out of comfort zone. I had never been confronted with a problem like this before so I was unsure how to handle it. I showed her a basic mapping technique (concept mapping) and she was ok after that. It did get me thinking though… why do people have a hard time visualising concepts?

My argument: people have abandoned pictures in western education

I have watched my eldest daughter draw inventive pictures and create masterpieces only to have that ‘educated’ out of her by the end of grade three. When asked to visualise anything she really struggles now compared with several years ago. Further, the inability of people to apply their imagination to problems, offering new and innovative solutions is somehow linked to the ability to picture things.  During school I felt myself drifting out the window imagining something else while the teacher was talking. I often remember being interrupted by the teacher who would say something like, “Luke stop daydreaming and focus on your work.” Ahh but what great adventures I had staring out that window. I fought crime, solved problems and created new and better realities. Alas, it’s take then best part of 25 years to realise that those methods instilled in me at such an early age have limited my capacity to imagine.

Restoring the capacity to imagine

Reading dulls the mind. Already by now most of you have stopped at this point in the article. Which makes that last sentence somewhat redundant. Let me give you a little test. Imagine you are sitting as a passenger in your car. Can you see the glove box? What about the windscreen? What’s happening as you imagine yourself in this setting? If you can’t do this then you were like me you had lost your capacity to imagine. Here’s a snippet from something I wrote (from this site which I never get time to update) a while ago:

Eunice looked into the small room where her sleeping daughter lay tightly strapped to a bed. Given that she had lost her husband to schizophrenia, she wondered why she hadn’t seen this coming.

Now you are doing it. You are seeing a girl strapped to a bed. You are picturing a mental ward… whatever YOUR perception of that is likely to be. You have seen clothing, pictures on the wall, the room and so on. Why can’t we apply this same thinking to our problems, businesses or other stuff?

My challenge to you

I want you to do something.  I am going to do this too so don’t worry.  Woah man… no it’s not like that.  Take a specific area of your life and begin to apply your imagination to it.  See what you come up with.  Let me finish with the story I began at the start of this post.  The student in question still looked a little puzzled after I used the concept mapping technique so I asked her to use her imagination.  I asked her to think what would it be like IF she could think this way?  How would it feel? What connections would you see?  What steps would you take?  This got her passed the “can’t do it bit” and she actually did a very good job in the end.

The imagination is probably the most underrated part of our brains.  It can take us places our logic can only follow… it can picture for us new realities and if you believe in positive (intentional) spirituality it can even effect reality!  So why not give it a go and let me know how it works out?

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