Imagination. Creativity. Curiosity.
What happens when we neglect these jewels of our minds?
We turn into sour, numb lunatics.
We morph into agitated mice in boring metal cages and pre-programmed robots incapable of creating dreams. We become walking corpses of shifting anxiety and seek relief in a glass of wine, a snort of coke, a prescription pill, a stranger’s mouth or a high intensity notification from a tiny bright screen.
Who has time or space to hear the barely audible whispers from our long neglected imaginations? Our imaginations are banished during the 9-5 workday, locked in our internal jails, only to fleetingly emerge at night, if we are lucky. I’ve heard many people recently say,
“I don’t have dreams anymore.”
How many imaginations have been snuffed out, amputated, severed, scorched, locked up, stomped on, shattered, numbed, ran over, dissolved, disintegrated, transformed to dust or simply ignored?
We’ve become modern mindless consumers who unquestioningly have absorbed the cunning marketers’ messages which were carved out in backrooms and Powerpoint presentations not that long ago. We accept this like blind children. We stopped thinking for ourselves long ago.
Somewhere along the way, we stopped thinking of ourselves as creators.
But now that paradigm is being blown wide open. For the first time in human history, each of us has the opportunity to reach the entire world, for free, if we choose to do so. We can create our own airwaves (podcasts), our own channels (YouTube), our own monetized blogs (Steemit.com), our own storefronts, book publishing, apps, ICOs, the list goes on. But many of us are depressed, stressed, unable to focus, distracted, lacking both time and money to commit to the task or simply don't have access to the knowledge or resources.
Many of us are from a different paradigm. We were born into a cultural wasteland.
We are from the vapid world of consumerism and centralized power and we have been programmed to believe that we do not possess the skill, talent, gumption, genius, creativity or the (insert a thousand more attributes here) to carve out our unique path of discovery and life. Our imaginations have withered, to the delight of the mass production puppeteers.
Mega Corporations are fairly new inventions. Humans did not evolve from them, and so we must examine them with careful intelligence.
We have forgotten the thousands of years of humans creating things like hair art to remember the dead, recipes for new meals, crops, collages, letters, books, scientific theories, explorations of the sky, jewelry, dances, paintings on the wall, paper cut-outs, paper-making, masks, studies of static electricity and so many numerous, interesting things in life. We have forgotten the gift economy that flourished in tribes of the past. We have forgotten what formed our own humanity.
We need to reinvent what it is to be human.
And this reinvention is happening right now in decentralized virtual nations. We need to bring back our imaginations more than ever. The present and future paradigm of becoming a creator demands us to do it.
If you're lost like most people on earth right now, here’s what you can do:
1. Make a pact with your imagination.
What do I mean? This means you need to first notice it, respect it, bend to its wishes. You have to vigilant. You can’t be lazy. If you have too much shame, work on resolving that first. For example, my imagination usually presents itself to me in the form of an obsession or fantasy. Somewhere along the way, I was taught that obsessions and fantasies are bad. They are not. Let me repeat, OBSESSIONS AND FANTASIES ARE NOT BAD. They are the fascinating, lonely children of your imagination. They are desperately trying to tell you something. Listen to them, follow them, develop them. Then let them go after you have properly nurtured and designed them.
2. Take up some new kind of activity.
If you’re a writer, start painting, if you’re a painter, start playing an instrument. Einstein used to play the violin when he was struggling to solve a mathematical problem. Changing your creative dial effectively lowers the stakes for your mind and allows it to become flexible again. This activity is called combinatory play. I consider myself to be a visual artist but people kept telling me to write a book. Now I move in and out of many creative disciplines and allow myself to explore without much thought about outcomes. My mind is much more flexible now that I have cast off an identity for my ego.
3. If your mind is completely blank and you have lost touch with your imagination, I suggest you begin the process of cutting away things like stressful jobs, bad relationships, addictions and so forth.
The only way I can hear the whispers from my curiosity is to have silence and solitude. I still have negative compulsions but now I am aware of these bad habits. I’ve developed a new feeling of calm and mental acuity that I have not had access to for a very long time. Mainly because I was drunk for a significant portion of my 30's.
Make a list of your life’s activities and figure out what to chop away. Carve out silence. Listen to your own mind until you can feel your creative impulses again.
If you really want to blow your mind, read Andrei Draganescu’s article, Evolving. Here's part of it summed up for you:
"You are not special. Elon Musk is. This system glorifies the ones who somehow break the funnel. These rogues then spill out large amounts of change into our environment. To contain this, we devised a system of investing humans with special abilities. Of course we don’t have them, only they do.
The personality cult pattern is the foundation of the culture of heroes. From ancient demigods to modern day pop stars and fame flooded CEOs. It is all about how they are simply better than everyone else.
No one is better than everyone else. We’re all sweaty and smelly at times and mean and stupid at other times. Some of us exploit opportunities, that’s it. Opportunities are cracks produced by environment into the walls of the funnel of change. -Andrei Draganescu
And perhaps Andrei's best line he ever wrote is:
“I hate the orgasmic drop of alive that bursts only to vanish.”
Cheers,
Stellabelle
this article first appeared on Medium.com in a slightly altered form.
When we create, we assist in the expansion of the Universe and in turn are rewarded with the great feeling that comes from it.
Unfortunately public schooling hinders imagination, curiosity and creativity because it's not easy to control people with these traits.
Thank you for a great post :o)
Michael
Outstanding post and narrative. I am in awe of your writing skills. ☆☆☆☆☆🙂
I'm just getting started. A vision of castle appeared to me today..........something I will name Crypto Castle, a place that only accepts cryptocurrency.
I can't wait to read it.
The creative power of the mind can never be overestimated. Any great innovation and invention has its root in the mind. That's why it is said that "Blind mind is worse than blind eyes". We should try to employ our creative acumen on a daily basis.
Awesome piece.
great quote, who is it from?
I fix computers, design, write, do some gardening. In and out from everything as far as I can remember. The thought that some people just focus on one and are still able to function is beyond me.
financial lack of freedom is the main problem....
always has been. But at least one can choose different revenue streams this way while keeping themselves sane.
Muy buen post. Dejo mi voto!
https://Steemit.com/@jhelbich
"A dream within a dream, from someone else's dream. The dream begins to fall because someone spoke it all. I can't seem to recall, when you became I...
Awakened" (((3j)))
"Timeless Alchemy"
Wow, you really do deserve all the attention you get on here. I started writing stories and essays when I had writers block working on my songs. The creativity is always flowing, you just need to find from which route it's taking, and meet it halfway
You surprise me Stella. Next time I'm at the wrong side of the pond, I'll make sure to say hi.
Hi @stellabelle found you through the interview your did with @terrybrock. I a very happy to found your content! It is exactly the content I am looking for and intend to produce! Regarding your article here, I think becoming a creator is one of the very few options we all have. Being a corporate "drone" or a generic is a surefire professional way to become obsolete!
I explained in an older post here about the transistion from the knowledge economy to the idea economy: it is already older than 7 days, so no upvote is necessary but I would enormously appreciate your considered comment should you find it interesting.
I aim to create a group of like minded people here on Steemit to explore these ideas and experiment and practice these new skills.
https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@the-traveller/the-reason-why-i-want-to-build-a-platform-on-steemit-and-why-you-should-too-the-idea-economy
Nobody is an expert in this we will all need to learn the new rules for the new economy:
without.....Imagination. Creativity. Curiosity....will become "machine"...
Interesting topic for this post!
I really liked the "Make a pact with your imagination." part
Followed you and Upvoted for more awesome content in future!
thank you.....yes, make a pact with your imagination, no one has the exact same one as you.
Very inspiring post!!
thank you
Hey Stella! First off great content as always.
Secondly, I wanted to let you know that you might want to rethink your 100% power posting.
There is a better reward reaping if you get SBD and convert it to STEEM.
Hope this helps you my friend!
Glad to have you around,
~ @Timbo
thanks, but i'm trying to simplify my life right now.
Haha, no worries! I think we are all wanting to do that.
At least I know I am.
Really cool article Im pretty amazed!! Looking forward to your new posts
thanks
awesome
Yes, we look at the outliers like Elon Musk and compare ourselves, but we can each use more of our imagination and increase our capacity.
Well, it's simple: most people are not as aggressive or productive as Elon Musk.
And most don't know how to take advantage of opportunities either.
True! I think I read Elon only gets 4 hours sleep a night! And timing is everything for opportunities, and knowing your priorites.
Inspiring post and you are so right! We are being pushed to live a life controlled by consumerism and centralized power. Free speech, imagination and creative seem to be lost arts these days!
That's why I still play and run tabletop role-playing games. I am going to start one soon on discord on the whale shares server. But I'm in the hospital ATM with spinal cord damage.
Kindrid spirit 🕉😍
Most people dreams have been flush down the toilet like a decade ago. For many it didn't happened, they watch tv, have shitty job and they drink on the weekend. In schools, left brained ways of thinking are generally favored over right brained, which is associated with creativity, emotion and intuitiveness. Great post. Thank you for your insight.
i can completely agree with whats being said here.
SteemIT has been helping me tap into that creative well that i've been missing for so long.
All SO true. Good reminder. Thank you.
Modern day plato's cave
what does it mean?
Freeing our minds from various programs allow the individual to unleash the jewels of our minds. ;)
The Old Steve Jobs paradigm
The entire system is set up to attack and suppress our souls connectivity to the universe including our higher selves- they do it through frequencies, poisons in food, air, and 'medicine'- all designed to keep humanity from clearly seeing that we are all powerful co-creators but only few have yet realized this.
Your writing skills certainly have blossomed since you found steemit as your muse and podium to speak from. You were gregarious when we first met in person but I didn't realize that there was so much pent-up creativity waiting to burst forth. It's a privilege to see you find your wings and soar
Good advice to implement, thank you for sharing! :)
Excellent piece, thanks for posting! Mind if I link to it in an article I'm putting up tomorrow (6/13)? It's a "here's how to do it right" link. :)
some beautiful thinking here @stellabelle, thank you!
This was a really interesting reading:) Being an artist I sometimes thought about how my mind creates images. And came to the conclusion. A white rabbit comes inside it and tells me what to do:)
ha ha! white rabbit.......
Yep, right inside the creative zone of my head:)