What's the Use of Imagination?
Imagination is often unjustly regarded as a ‘weak’ activity. From infancy, we are taught to control it and repress it in favour of more productive mental functions, such as logical reasoning.
But imagination serves a fundamental part in our mental and cognitive processes, from our perception of reality to the way we project ourselves and communicate with others.
In fact, our life experience without imagination would not only be dull and dry - it would be unthinkable.
“Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it, we go nowhere.”
- Carl Sagan
Imagination probably developed in the human brain as a cognitive tool to protect the species.
Drawing from memories of learned facts (Crossing the river wets my feet. Fallen tree is sturdy enough to walk on.), the human brain developed the capacity to extrapolate these conclusions to other situations in other different, possible time-space environments (What if I fell sturdy tree over river? Then, I could cross it and not get wet).
Although imagining may seem a simple process, this ability requires the synchronized work of several parts of the brain working at unison for this thought process to work.
Interestingly enough, the same brain regions that control our perception of reality are the ones in charge of our imagination. Which may explain why some dreams feel uncannily real, and why our imaginations have the power of convincing us of things that aren’t actually there.
To learn more about how our brain elicits imagination, you may watch the following video:
But, what are the practical uses of Imagination?
1.- Prevention/Protection
Some of the most practical uses of imagination reside in the planning, anticipation and solution of problems.
Thanks to imagination, coupled with logic, we can plan our actions and responses in advance so as to avert problems (if I yell at my boss I may get fired ), prevent and plan for solutions before the events happen (I will take an umbrella in case it rains).
Guided by logic, imagination allows us to come up with an array of different possibilities and choose the one most adapted to our situation and our available resources.
Yet, imagination for prevention can be used at a deeper, more practical level.
From rehearsing a job interview to evacuation drills, putting ourselves in imaginary situations allow our brains to develop the responsive tools to react effectively when the situation actually happens.
Thanks to imagination, we can navigate the different possible scenarios before they happen, allowing us to calculate the outcomes and take the best decisions in advance.
2.- Creativity/Innovation
Necessity may be the mother of all invention, but without imagination, we could not proceed from the basic idea to a finished solution.
Designers are always on the lookout to solve problems and improve the physical world around them. How can this chair be better? What could I create to keep the drain from clogging?
Although imagining may seem a simple process, this ability requires the synchronized work of several parts of the brain working at unison for this thought process to work.
Interestingly enough, the same brain regions that control our perception of reality are the ones in charge of our imagination. Which may explain why some dreams feel uncannily real, and why our imaginations have the power of convincing us of things that aren’t actually there.
To learn more about how our brain elicits imagination, you may watch the following video:
Video - The Neuroscience of Imagination (4:48")
But, what are the practical uses of Imagination?
1.- Prevention/Protection
Some of the most practical uses of imagination reside in the planning, anticipation and solution of problems.
Thanks to imagination, coupled with logic, we can plan our actions and responses in advance so as to avert problems (if I yell at my boss I may get fired ), prevent and plan for solutions before the events happen (I will take an umbrella in case it rains).
Guided by logic, imagination allows us to come up with an array of different possibilities and choose the one most adapted to our situation and our available resources.
Yet, imagination for prevention can be used at a deeper, more practical level.
From rehearsing a job interview to evacuation drills, putting ourselves in imaginary situations allow our brains to develop the responsive tools to react effectively when the situation actually happens.
Thanks to imagination, we can navigate the different possible scenarios before they happen, allowing us to calculate the outcomes and take the best decisions in advance.
2.- Creativity/Innovation
Necessity may be the mother of all invention, but without imagination, we could not proceed from the basic idea to a finished solution.
Designers are always on the lookout to solve problems and improve the physical world around them. How can this chair be better? What could I create to keep the drain from clogging?
Mixing logic with imagination, the designer shuffles through several imagined possibilities until the best solution is met, thus improving what was already there or coming up with a brand-new product that solves our needs.
Artists draw inspiration from everything around them, serving themselves from all five senses to elicit compositions, poems, novels, films, works of art and more to entertain us and enrich our lives.
But even those not in the creative fields possess a dose of creativity that usually sparks in moments of need, improvising to help defuse an emergency or find a rapid solution to an unforeseen problem, such as a coffee spill with no paper towels around, or a shoe that tears in the middle of the street.
Without imagination, we would be at odds trying to respond quickly to these situations.
3.- Empathy
This use of imagination is essential to coexist harmoniously in society. Imagination allows us to understand how others feel by putting ourselves in other people’s shoes.
Asking ourselves how others feel in different situations trigger our emotional response and helps us to connect with them and gain a deeper understanding of the world we live in.
People with high levels of empathy imagine themselves in others, and this allows him/her to connect effectively with everyone around them, helping them to prevent and solve problems.
This connection between empathy and imagination was proven by the social psychologists Emanuel Castaño and David Comer Kidd in 2013.
In their study of emotional recognition skills, they found that the test subjects who scored the strongest variations in empathy before and after reading were those who had read literary fiction, such as ‘Jane Eyre’ or ‘Moby Dick’ (as opposed to light fiction, such as comics, or non-fiction).
The results of this study proved the role of imagination in strengthening our emotional links in the brain, which in turn allow us to respond more effectively when confronted with real life situations.
4.- Inspiration for Life
Imagination can fuel our energies towards a determined goal. For instance, it’s not uncommon that children imagine themselves in a profession that they carry on later in adult life; yet it all started simply with the act of imagining themselves in it.
From planning a holiday to envisioning your dream job, imagination is the fuel that feeds our desires and provide us with resilience to the drawbacks we’ll inevitably face on the way.
Envisioning, or imagining firmly one’s goal, is usually stated as the first step in planning one’s future.
As thousands of great achievers have attested throughout human history, having a clear goal in mind goes coupled with having a clear imagination of what you what to achieve, what is needed to get there and where you want to be.
Salvador Dalí, "Apparition of a face and a fruit bowl on the beach", oil, 1938
Artists draw inspiration from everything around them, serving themselves from all five senses to elicit compositions, poems, novels, films, works of art and more to entertain us and enrich our lives.
But even those not in the creative fields possess a dose of creativity that usually sparks in moments of need, improvising to help defuse an emergency or find a rapid solution to an unforeseen problem, such as a coffee spill with no paper towels around, or a shoe that tears in the middle of the street.
Without imagination, we would be at odds trying to respond quickly to these situations.
3.- Empathy
This use of imagination is essential to coexist harmoniously in society. Imagination allows us to understand how others feel by putting ourselves in other people’s shoes.
Asking ourselves how others feel in different situations trigger our emotional response and helps us to connect with them and gain a deeper understanding of the world we live in.
People with high levels of empathy imagine themselves in others, and this allows him/her to connect effectively with everyone around them, helping them to prevent and solve problems.
This connection between empathy and imagination was proven by the social psychologists Emanuel Castaño and David Comer Kidd in 2013.
In their study of emotional recognition skills, they found that the test subjects who scored the strongest variations in empathy before and after reading were those who had read literary fiction, such as ‘Jane Eyre’ or ‘Moby Dick’ (as opposed to light fiction, such as comics, or non-fiction).
The results of this study proved the role of imagination in strengthening our emotional links in the brain, which in turn allow us to respond more effectively when confronted with real life situations.
4.- Inspiration for Life
Imagination can fuel our energies towards a determined goal. For instance, it’s not uncommon that children imagine themselves in a profession that they carry on later in adult life; yet it all started simply with the act of imagining themselves in it.
From planning a holiday to envisioning your dream job, imagination is the fuel that feeds our desires and provide us with resilience to the drawbacks we’ll inevitably face on the way.
Envisioning, or imagining firmly one’s goal, is usually stated as the first step in planning one’s future.
As thousands of great achievers have attested throughout human history, having a clear goal in mind goes coupled with having a clear imagination of what you what to achieve, what is needed to get there and where you want to be.
Logic alone is simply not enough to fuel the human spirit. Imagination provides that indispensable spark of genius to achieve our dreams.
5.- A Thermometer of Mental Health
Our bodies are inextricably connected to our brains. Every thought and emotion we have provokes a physical response, whether we realize it or not.
Using our thoughts through positive imagination can help us control negative reactions such as stress, anxiety, panic attacks, etc.
In addition, imagination as a cognitive ability may reflect our mind and overall body health.
People suffering from depression may lose their ability to imagine, and if they do, they usually may only elicit pessimistic images.
On the other hand, people suffering from severe mental disorders may have unhinged imaginations that border on the psychotic, endangering the patient’s life and those that surround him/her.
Having a healthy dose of imagination is a characteristic of the healthy brain and, in turn, of a healthy life.
6.- Learning and Understanding
Ever considered you need imagination in order to learn? We usually tend to associate learning with hard reasoning and logic, but scientists have proven that our brains actually learn better through the use of mental associations.
Unless we make the connection from theoretical data to practical use adapted to our needs, theory is forgotten and no learning takes place in the brain. This retention can only come through the use of imagination.
Which is why we may forget a foreign language lesson in a language we don’t need to learn, focussed on subjects unrelated to our interests.
Practical examples trigger the brain’s imaginative capacity, creating neuronal connections, activating the theory into practical use, and inspiring us to transfer that new piece of knowledge into other scenarios.
This is how imagination has inspired countless scientists throughout the centuries, from Archimedes’ ‘Eureka’ moment to Newton’s apple fall - imagination is fundamental in our understanding of our world and the learning of its functioning.
7.- Essential in Decision Taking
From the clothes we’re planning to wear to the food choices we make, imagination plays a decisive role in all of the daily decisions we make, both big and small.
Even with well-established routines, we all use imagination in order to navigate more swiftly through our daily lives, sometimes so quickly that we barely even notice.
Although we may be usually lead by logic and reason in our choices, this one alone isn’t enough in our mental decision-taking process. In addition, we need to envision the outcome of our choices, and that’s were imagination comes into play.
“Should I buy those shoes now or wait until the end of the month?”. “I crave pizza, but if I eat it now I may feel sick later.” “Should I drop in now or wait until they finish talking?”
If we can’t imagine the results of our choices, it’s common that we may not be able to choose and postpone our decision until we can. That’s how indispensable our imagination can be.
8.- Key to Our Happiness
When we remember a nice moment in our lives, we experience again the happiness we felt then. The same happens when we elicit imaginary events that we wish or expect - our bodies react to them as if they were real.
Imagining positive things for our near or distant future makes us instantly happy, more hopeful in achieving favourable outcomes. On the contrary, imagining negative results can hinder our actions and make us lose hope and faith in the future.
Although our brains can correctly process and distinguish reality from fantasy, their processes are remarkably similar and sometimes overlap. But we can profit from this faculty.
Our minds have the incredible capacity to convince ourselves of things, even if they haven’t really happened.
Proof of this are psychosomatic reactions, hypochondriasis and somatization disorders, all of which link the overall health of a person to his/her mental images and imagination.
But if imagination can make us sick, it can also help us cure, as it has been clinically proven in health visualizations carried out with excellent results in hospitals and clinics all over the world.
Life is unpredictable, but we can amp the odds of our happiness by expecting the best and imagine ourselves happy.
As we see, imagination is not a useless mental trick of our brains, but a fundamental tool in our evolution that helps us build and live our lives.
In fact, imagination is so important that it’s safe to say that not having imagination hinders our understanding of the world and how we communicate with it.
Although engaging in any artistic or creative activity will get your imagination juices flowing, some activities are better than others when it comes to achieving permanent benefits.
Many will probably think that watching fantasy films or playing video games are a good way to spark their imaginations, but one of the proven, most effective ways to work your imagination muscles is to read works of fiction.
Why read instead of watching films? Reading requires the brain to work at a deeper level of consciousness, forcing the reader to focus, make associations and scramble for different elements that would not come up in real life, putting him/her in first plane into situations foreign to his/her ordinary experience. Visual entertainment skips all these mental exercises, thus lessening its effectiveness.
Group games are another fun and sociable way of working your imagination. They include role-plays, charades, make believe, disguises, board games such as Clue, Pictify, Dixit, and more - anything that may have the players assume a different identity and interact with other players.
For literary-minded people, writing your own stories using prompts is a well-known tool to get the imagination juices flowing. For those with histrionic inclinations, enrolling in a theatre workshop may be a great way to let out their inner child and play. These two activities also provide a secondary benefit by enriching your verbal skills.
Finally, drawing and coloring, even if it’s only doodles, also gives the brain a workout of imagination and provides the mind with a escape valve from worries and stress.
Scientists specially recommend activating their imagination to those who normally work on highly methodical jobs (accountants, financial workers, clinical researchers, scientists, etc.), so as to create a balance in their neural functions and ‘de-congest’ the brain areas responsible for logical reasoning.
5.- A Thermometer of Mental Health
Our bodies are inextricably connected to our brains. Every thought and emotion we have provokes a physical response, whether we realize it or not.
Using our thoughts through positive imagination can help us control negative reactions such as stress, anxiety, panic attacks, etc.
In addition, imagination as a cognitive ability may reflect our mind and overall body health.
People suffering from depression may lose their ability to imagine, and if they do, they usually may only elicit pessimistic images.
On the other hand, people suffering from severe mental disorders may have unhinged imaginations that border on the psychotic, endangering the patient’s life and those that surround him/her.
Having a healthy dose of imagination is a characteristic of the healthy brain and, in turn, of a healthy life.
6.- Learning and Understanding
Ever considered you need imagination in order to learn? We usually tend to associate learning with hard reasoning and logic, but scientists have proven that our brains actually learn better through the use of mental associations.
Unless we make the connection from theoretical data to practical use adapted to our needs, theory is forgotten and no learning takes place in the brain. This retention can only come through the use of imagination.
Which is why we may forget a foreign language lesson in a language we don’t need to learn, focussed on subjects unrelated to our interests.
Practical examples trigger the brain’s imaginative capacity, creating neuronal connections, activating the theory into practical use, and inspiring us to transfer that new piece of knowledge into other scenarios.
This is how imagination has inspired countless scientists throughout the centuries, from Archimedes’ ‘Eureka’ moment to Newton’s apple fall - imagination is fundamental in our understanding of our world and the learning of its functioning.
7.- Essential in Decision Taking
From the clothes we’re planning to wear to the food choices we make, imagination plays a decisive role in all of the daily decisions we make, both big and small.
Even with well-established routines, we all use imagination in order to navigate more swiftly through our daily lives, sometimes so quickly that we barely even notice.
Although we may be usually lead by logic and reason in our choices, this one alone isn’t enough in our mental decision-taking process. In addition, we need to envision the outcome of our choices, and that’s were imagination comes into play.
“Should I buy those shoes now or wait until the end of the month?”. “I crave pizza, but if I eat it now I may feel sick later.” “Should I drop in now or wait until they finish talking?”
If we can’t imagine the results of our choices, it’s common that we may not be able to choose and postpone our decision until we can. That’s how indispensable our imagination can be.
8.- Key to Our Happiness
When we remember a nice moment in our lives, we experience again the happiness we felt then. The same happens when we elicit imaginary events that we wish or expect - our bodies react to them as if they were real.
Imagining positive things for our near or distant future makes us instantly happy, more hopeful in achieving favourable outcomes. On the contrary, imagining negative results can hinder our actions and make us lose hope and faith in the future.
Although our brains can correctly process and distinguish reality from fantasy, their processes are remarkably similar and sometimes overlap. But we can profit from this faculty.
Our minds have the incredible capacity to convince ourselves of things, even if they haven’t really happened.
Proof of this are psychosomatic reactions, hypochondriasis and somatization disorders, all of which link the overall health of a person to his/her mental images and imagination.
But if imagination can make us sick, it can also help us cure, as it has been clinically proven in health visualizations carried out with excellent results in hospitals and clinics all over the world.
Life is unpredictable, but we can amp the odds of our happiness by expecting the best and imagine ourselves happy.
As we see, imagination is not a useless mental trick of our brains, but a fundamental tool in our evolution that helps us build and live our lives.
In fact, imagination is so important that it’s safe to say that not having imagination hinders our understanding of the world and how we communicate with it.
How to Develop Our Imagination?
Although engaging in any artistic or creative activity will get your imagination juices flowing, some activities are better than others when it comes to achieving permanent benefits.
Many will probably think that watching fantasy films or playing video games are a good way to spark their imaginations, but one of the proven, most effective ways to work your imagination muscles is to read works of fiction.
Why read instead of watching films? Reading requires the brain to work at a deeper level of consciousness, forcing the reader to focus, make associations and scramble for different elements that would not come up in real life, putting him/her in first plane into situations foreign to his/her ordinary experience. Visual entertainment skips all these mental exercises, thus lessening its effectiveness.
Group games are another fun and sociable way of working your imagination. They include role-plays, charades, make believe, disguises, board games such as Clue, Pictify, Dixit, and more - anything that may have the players assume a different identity and interact with other players.
For literary-minded people, writing your own stories using prompts is a well-known tool to get the imagination juices flowing. For those with histrionic inclinations, enrolling in a theatre workshop may be a great way to let out their inner child and play. These two activities also provide a secondary benefit by enriching your verbal skills.
Finally, drawing and coloring, even if it’s only doodles, also gives the brain a workout of imagination and provides the mind with a escape valve from worries and stress.
Scientists specially recommend activating their imagination to those who normally work on highly methodical jobs (accountants, financial workers, clinical researchers, scientists, etc.), so as to create a balance in their neural functions and ‘de-congest’ the brain areas responsible for logical reasoning.
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