On Imagination, and Magic
On words, magic, communication, playing pretend, and the distinctions that do and don’t matter.
I believe in magic. Or, actually, I don’t.
What I mean is: it doesn’t matter either way.
First of all, some context. Let’s say “magic” is the playful, weird amalgamation of mystery, influence, surprise, and results; it’s the process of making or conjuring something that previously didn’t exist.
I experience all of these things on a regular basis, and I trust that you do, too. You might credit magic as the source, or you might roll your eyes at the suggestion. It honestly doesn’t matter whether you or I believe in magic or not, because what you and I both have is the very real, very human, and very enchanting capacity for imagination.
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“At the end of the day, when we’re trading in words, we’re already trading in imagined ideas.”
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Let me back up for a moment. Whatever we believe about how things come into our lives doesn’t matter so much as the fact that they do:
~Surprising experiences catch us off guard, little detours—gifts?—that we did not always ask for.
~Or we observe ourselves influencing positive change.
~Or we observe ourselves being influenced by the good, creative efforts of those around us, all of us making ourselves and each other different, bigger.
However unforeseeable they can be: good things happen. Even when we can’t explain their origins or follow their trajectories, we live and breathe their tangible impact.
Given the staunch Taurus that I am, that tangible impact detail is extra important to me, and it puts me at higher risk for feeling grumpy when I don’t have proof of something or, at the very least, understand why it happened. What magic?! I like when things are physical, palpable. I like when I can engage with the material edges of an idea through a book made of paper. I like when I’m given an example of something that I could go out into the world and replicate with my own body. I like being able to see things and, yes, I like the feeling of verification or realness that such seeing affords. Can I pick it up? Can I place my ear on it like a seashell? Can I give it a hug? All my favorite feelings bubble up when the answer is yes.
Which makes being a writer, and an especially creative one at that, a strange reality. First of all, metaphors are so good and useful precisely because THEY AREN’T REAL. (My heart is not a snapdragon, which is why it carries a certain beautiful weight when I say that it is.)
And second: “No ideas but in things,” declared grandpa W.C.W., which I say with affection, but even his things came in the form of words and strange poetry and immeasurable images, ones that people are obsessed with taking out of context and trying to make less strange and more thingy.
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“What is magic but the strength of observation married with the flexibility of imagination?”
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What I’m trying to say is this: At the end of the day, when we’re trading in words, we’re already trading in imagined ideas, these linguistic shapes with meanings we’ve agreed upon—even this I wonder about sometimes—and which we use to communicate what’s inside of us at any given moment, whether that’s a feeling that needs expressing or a combo meal that needs ordering. The stakes vary drastically.
Even by simply talking about the imagination, I’ve already crossed over into the world of imagination. What lives inside me? Blood, guts, organs, tissue, muscles, bones, and I’m guessing a few other things. But to say that ideas and feelings, wants and creative desires, live inside of me…Where?!
To talk about imagination requires the use of our imagination. Isn’t that goofy!? And magical!! The minute we’re dealing with images, ideas, concepts, or creative notions, we’re in the world of playing pretend, and making stuff up, and utilizing metaphor to articulate truth. There’s an argument in here for the creative possibilities that exist around us 24/7, which don’t require scheduled time or special paper or even clear intentions. How do you feel reading this, right now? OK, now push that feeling into a sentence or two, and think for a moment how you might phrase it to a random stranger passing by…You’ve conjured something! You’ve created something, using your imagination to interpret what’s happening inside of you, and you’ve brought that immaterial inner thing out into the world through a blend of choice, creativity, and interaction.
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Let’s say “imagination” is this beautiful, weird amalgamation of mystery (where do these feelings and ideas even come from?!), influence, surprise, and results. We use our imagination to make things that didn’t exist before we made them.
Writers are magicians, and it doesn’t matter if I’m basically a child playing dress-up with that statement, because the magical consequences of writing are very real. Anybody who has ever read a book that changed their life knows this truth. And anybody who has ever written something and then immediately experienced clarity, satisfaction, deeper self-knowledge, or pure excitement also knows this truth.
The minute we’re talking about or utilizing our imagination, we’re in a world of enchantment: Where does our imagination even live? In our minds? Our bodies? Is it the same thing as our creative channel? How do we trace either of them?
We use our imagination to make things. Often, we follow it well beyond the boundaries of reason, rationality, or explanation. I don’t remember what she said to me, just the smoky feeling of devotion. ← That's a real sentence that I just made up! Friends, what I’m talking about is right at your fingertips.
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What is magic, then, but the strength of observation married with the flexibility of imagination? You can be the grumpiest Taurus in the world, operating according to an old definition you haven’t quite purged yet, one that equates safety with proof, and still find yourself in a place surrounded by enchantment, unexplained phenomena, and a disbelief you can’t help but let yourself fall into like a bear hug. (Similes! They’re bewitching, too).
The way to this unbelievable place is through the page. The skeptic’s route is the same one as the believer’s.