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"Imagination"

I keep getting this horrible feeling every now and again that I'm slowly losing my imagination... that it's seeping away, never to be bought back by my childlike nature that I'm doomed to lose... er, or something. But what IS imagination anyway?

As far as I can tell, the imagination, if it er, exists independently, is fueled by wanting to escape from life itself. Sounds very depressing, but it seems logical.

That the more you hate, or maybe feel nothing in the world you're involved in, the more your brain tries to escape through the imagination. Maybe it's not a completely solid reasoning, but there's got to be some truth in it.

And if we take that reasoning a little further, could it be possible to suggest, perhaps, that to improve your imagination, you just have to become bored of life some more?

It's a scary thought. At the moment I'm stuck over what I want to do with myself. Either to head into animation (which would probably require me doing an art foundation that I don't particularly want to do for reasons that have yet to return to me (I think they're around about my feet by now)), or to chase up my other dream of running a cinema, which er, isn't going to be particularly easy either. I think I'll let that one lie for a few decades actually.

If I'm to live by my imagination, am I destined to become even more bored of life, more of a hermit than I am already? Could, even, the boredom of art classes fuel a deeper relationship with my imagination?

And do stories in themselves just express the desire to leave this terrible world behind and lose themselves in one of their own?

Possibly. The last few years have been the most exciting in my life, and I guess my tendency to try to escape has been less than average.

So what am I supposed to do? Dull myself down, stay home and stare at walls?

It's strange, but with so much stress over what I'm supposed to be doing with myself, it's incredibly hard to lose myself in anything. So maybe it's not just the excitement in life, but the stress of it too. And that's not just for writing/drawing, but for losing myself in a movie, music too.

At least, that's what I'm hoping. That I can just carry on down my difficult decisions and peril etc, and somehow take a break, relax, and be rid of the stress of every day druge.

Now that I'm finally on medication for being psychotic (You have NO idea how close I was to becoming Batman), all that I've yet to conquer is my stress. Ok, I'm allowed to fear social situations, I'm a born and bred psychotic hermit, we know this. But I guess I could calm them.

Then the next question I guess would be, if stress is a factor of imagination, would the whole imagintive process require an open mind, and does the stress mentioned close the mind?

What closes a mind, and what can be described as an open mind anyway? Surely there's no perfect state that could possibly be reached, as our minds will always be closed to some extent.

A fearless, stressless, open mind + boredom of surroundings + time = Imagination?

Science for the unscientific. It's rotten.

But still, it does seem to be that different mind states do encourage more and less working of the imagination. The only imagination that seems to come of stress is hallucinations, and they're another topic altogether.

Phew. It's a good thing to go from thinking you need to make life worse for yourself, to wanting to reduce your stress levels. Hurrah for thinking things through.

But what do you think? Is the imagination a tool bought upon us as a defensive act towards wanting to kill ourselves, or just nonsense that somehow our minds trawl out? Who knows, and indeed, who cares.

But it seems to me, at least, that the imaginative aren't hermits that want to push life away from themselves, that hate life so much that they wish to escape from it... but instead, perhaps they're fearless towards life, not removing themselves or hiding away, but adding to life itself with open minds. Sniff.

I know it's just going from half empty to half full in more words, but it's something I've struggled to understand all my life. Imagination is very important to me, so to turn it around from being the escape of the fearful to the tool of the fearless is a big change for me.

Comments? If you read all that you probably need a rest anyway. Any good advice for relaxing?

Oh and I have a self-obsessed imagination... I'm always the centre of my own little worlds.

I have a great imagination... I like it mroe now I'm older.

If I'm bored on the train I find myself drifting off into a lovely little world. Same when I'm stacking shelves at work, passes time.

oh and uh I just started doing some animations in my spare time, I got hold of a free flash tool, Insane Flash Animator, and with the help of one of my friends I made a short animation of a penguin eating a herring. Its not great but its pretty good for about 3hrs work and a first time effort. If you want to see it get SR to let me upload it. lol. or you could just ask me to post my email (cough)

What about kids, theyre generally happy, i.e not depressed and they have very active imaginations.

Imagination? I would put it down to an active mind. I was going to say an imaginative mind but that's probably going in circles.

I'll try again. You cannot lose your imagination, even when you are older but I do believe you can allow it to be stifled by the mundality of life. I suppose I am a good example of this. Quite imaginative while at school, mundane for years, then I found this site. I've always like short stories, snapshots of imagination. Hadn't written much since school but some of the stories on here re-fired my pleasure of both reading and writing them.

I'll admit that most of what I post isn't really that good but occasionally I will write something that I really like and if I really like it then that is all that matters. I have discovered that I don't have the vocabulary, or writing skill, to encompass all I wish to express but it doesn't detract from the pleasure I get from using my imagination.

How many times have you tried to express something you are seeing in your mind's eye to someone and they just don't 'get' it. How many times have you then turned around and said 'you just have no imagaination'.

I'd shoot myself if someone said this to me.

I dont know about this being bored makes me imaginative, it's certainly not the case for myself as i have no imagination whatsoever. I really think it's more to be with whether you are naturally openminded, i remember talking a while back on the subject or religion and love and how you could seem them in a scientific, realist way or let yourself believe and i think this is along the same lines, it goes to whether you can let go and escape not life but reality. if you want to go deeper you could be looking around supression and domination of character as a child, i suppose the difference between being told to behave and stop running around or let children be children, the more controlled and based in reality we are the more we shackle out minds.

Perhaps you're over-rating the imagination you used to have so are expecting too much from it and it probably doesn't produce so well under it's own pressure.


I know that that's EXACTLY what I'm doing. :-)

I see the imagination as just something to mess with. It's a giant playground. There can be one child on it kicking a stone, or an ant swarm of the little riddlers yacking and yucking.
It's something to indulge in, and I'm a glutton for it. I do hate it though when my doubt attempts to stifle my imagination with its what's-the-point whispers.

Heck, the guitar on Starla, the weird warbling under tones at the start, just beautiful, by the Pumpkins, connotes an imagined and half real world - from nowhere come images that are practically invisible, but they make me feel alive, feel the wonderful world - near my friends house is a view across to the west, to the moor and the sea and the wonderful imagined perfection beyond - at dawn, at dusk, at mid day, sun or cloud (but mainly sun!) this land is alive, the skyline just perfection, it sparks all kinds of emotions in me. If I have music, from Elliott to the guitar solo in 'Take The Veil Cerpin Taxt' by Mars Volta, to Jeff Buckley, to Nick Drake, to Orff, it just expands and takes me with it, weaving an eternally recyclable web of imagination.......it seems odd such specific music combines with such vague feeling, but it makes me utterly content and happy.

The Everlasting Gaze on the side of Mt. Meru, the flowing, layered chorus, just struck such a chord - again, the specific vaguery is strange, but it seems to be what fires my imagination...the sky, the clouds.....it really is hard to describe except in rant form, but it's what I try to do when I write my crap. The thing is, this has no name except my imagination latching onto something, somewhere. The beauty of the world perhaps, but that's arrogant - it's lodged in me somewhere, and I don't want to discover it, to spoil it. I just let it take hold.

/over.

True.

But each section of that creature will be built out of memories of other creatures, or other creatures parts, or other creaturs skins, or even some other object. You will make it up out of a million memories, or out of one. But you will have experienced each and every atom of that creature.