Yesterday’s post focused on the benefits of using your imagination.  The principle advocated channeling your imagination into innovative results.

Some great feedback I received pointed out sometimes we imagine things that frighten us.  In these cases, we could visualize nasty things and develop harmful ideas to counter them.

Filtering

With all our ideas and thoughts the process of filtering is critical to help us focus on real priorities.  That is things that matter to us or other people and justify taking consideration for employment in creative and innovative activities.

Filtering your imaginings to separate those that do not provide a value add and those that can be effectively used for the betterment of all (you and others) is not easy but really important.

The Easy Trap

Often we will focus on things that have lower value and impact but overall require less effort.  I can imagine the worse quite easily, worry about it (again with little effort) and classify it as something I cannot change (effortlessly).

Or I can focus my imagination and creativity on things that will make a difference.  Of course, this requires a little effort so I need to be motivated to act this way.

When we are encouraging and nurturing others (and even ourselves) to be creative and imaginative this needs some boundaries and guides to assist our filtering to be focused on things that can be useful.

While not an easy task, guidance to avoid focusing your imagination on the worst probably makes a lot of sense.  Although a little doom and gloom is probably part of the life experience.