When we were children, our imaginations served us well. They took us on wild adventures and helped us spin beautiful stories in which we were the author of our reality.
We played in the trees. Among piles of stones. Nature was our castle. Some days we were queens. Others witches, cooking pots of elixirs made from flowers plucked from nearby fields. Cool waters from the creek. Small fistfuls of dirt sprinkled in. These potions could cure the worst cases of heartache, illness, and even the dreaded curse of adulthood.
As we grew older, that beautiful mechanism of the mind began to deceive us. We learned words like good/bad. Right/wrong. The world began telling us to “get real” and “grow up”.
What was once our greatest ally, even our best friend, becomes a stranger.
We experience self doubt. Anxiety. Fear. We still act out the stories we imagine, but now filtered through a different lense.
And so, we imagine we are not enough. Imagine we are unsafe. Imagine we are insignificant.
Day after day. Week after week, we silently hear the world's stories about us, and imagine them to be true.
Repeat this imagined truth enough times, and it becomes a reality. Because the mind does not know the difference between something that is real and something that has been imagined.
Once the mind believes this self created truth, the body jumps on board. With the body and mind working together, our thoughts and feelings will work to reinforce what we believe to be true.
Becoming aware of the way our imaginations are in command of our actions and beliefs is the first step to regaining control over the reality we WANT to create. But just having the awareness is not enough.
How many of us have been in a situation that seems to repeat itself over and over, despite knowing that it isn’t good for us? Maybe it’s a choice with our diet, perhaps a relationship theme.
These are examples of how knowing the truth is not always enough to carry us to the result we are hoping for. Because the tracks of our repeated beliefs, those years of our imagined realities, are deep grooves in the mind.
So, how then do we break free from the self limiting world we’ve imagined ourselves into? Well, we imagine ourselves out of it of course.
This may sound rather silly, when at first your adult mind receives these words. But I assure you that the frequency with which you are currently and subconsciously using this superpower may also seem silly.
Consider an unreturned phone call, maybe a loved one. The mind begins to write a story, perhaps based on some facts, but we may also include some of our own “ideas” of why they haven’t called. “An accident” the mind reasons. “They’ve changed their minds” you consider. “I’m asking too much” you conclude.
When left unchecked the imagination can write a book, or a lifetime, on what it considers a possible reality.
