Gabriel Shirley

Today I attended a luncheon titled How to Cultivate Imagination, part of the Guiding Lights weekend on mentorship in Seattle. It was co-sponsored by Lincoln Center Institute (LCI) and Seattle Center Fund. LCI has a project called The Imagination Conversation that seeks to improve our focus on cultivating imagination in schools and in our society.

The panel included Bonnie Dunbar, former astronaut and current director of Seattle’s Museum of Flight, Tod Machover, co-director of the MIT Media Lab, Rosamund Zander, psychologist and author of The Art of Possibility and Charles Johnson, an acclaimed novelist and teacher at the University of Washington. I was especially interested to hear Tod Machover and Rosamund Zander since there is so much creativity coming out of the MIT Media Lab and I resonate with and appreciate Ros Zander’s work in The Art of Possibility.

The panelists each told stories about what experiences in their lives opened their capacity for imagination. Most told fabulous stories about being supported by parents, especially mothers, to explore their passions and pursue their dreams.

Tod Machover told a story about his mother as a new piano teacher inviting her children to run through the house and bring back an object that makes an interesting sound. She would ask, “What sound does it make?”, “What’s the loudest sound it can make?”, “What’s the softest?”, “How does it make you feel?”, “What do these sounds sound like together?” Pretty soon they had accomplished a musical composition with found objects. Then she would ask them to draw a picture of what they had just done so they could play the same music again the next week. I wish my piano teacher had used this method!

Ros Zander spoke of receiving a music box from her father when she was a small child, shortly after her parents had divorced. Her mother did not think the gift was appropriate for her age and tried to convince her that she could have a stuffed bear instead. Ros realized at that moment that she could have both things… the world of possibility and abundance thinking had opened up for her.

There was a good deal of discussion about creating an environment for imagination to flourish. Most panelists agreed that as mentors, we can create that environment but it is essential that the spark or passion for learning, the curiosity about something, be present in each person. Several felt that many kids today are not in touch with their passion. Often this seems to be connected to a fear of failure. Kids develop opinions about things without ever trying them ad a single failure can be reason enough to stop trying. How do we learn to have productive failures, to treat failure as a learning experience?

I believe that in order to be alive, each human being must have a creative, curious spark inside them. It may be only a smoldering ember, but it is an internal, generative energy for what they love and care about. If we as leaders and mentors can locate that spark and find a way to blow on it, we can help ignite the passion in our children, our co-workers, our employees, and ourselves. Once that spark is present, the conversation changes. Clarity of purpose is easier to access. At that point we can explore the best ways to engage that person’s passion, to open the space for their passion to expand and be directed in productive ways.

Another interesting piece that arose in the conversation was a tension between the need to “learn the past” to understand what has and has not been done so far, and the perspective that if we jump with both feet into a project that we care about, that is achievable and also a stretch, we will learn whatever we need to learn to make it happen. I’m a fan of jumping in with both feet, as long as the circumstances do not put lives in jeapordy. Anything that acts as a doorway to passion is a good place to start. There may be history, skills, and practice to do in order to fully achieve one’s vision. It is much easier to do that work when it is in service to something we care about.

The entire conversation reminded me that there is a strong connection between change methodologies, creativity, imagination, possibility, passion, purpose and practice (wow, that’s a lot of P’s!). When we engage ourselves creatively, we shift our world view, we shake up our established thought patterns. This act sparks the imagination and opens up new possibilities. New possibilities are a pathway for passion and purpose to find form through our practice in the world. Change methodologies seek to engage these elements on a collective level to help shift our ability to be creative, think systemically, and establish new patterns of practice that allow for a more dynamic environment. When we align our practices in service to our individual and collective passions, we create powerful life-affirming organizations that are adaptive to and even excited by change.

Tags: changehandbook, nexusforchange, adaptiveorganizations, creativity,