Life is full of problems. If we made a list of problems (or challenges, if you prefer) for most of us, it would be a very long list.
And that’s fine.
Life is what it is, and whatever we deal with we try to do the best we can.
There is just one problem with problem-solving.
In order to solve the problem, we might describe or think about the current situation, what maintains it, what we have done in the past to solve it, what options we currently see, and so on.
Our approach to problem-solving will be influenced by our beliefs about problems, what factors to include, how problem-focused or how solutions-focused we prefer to be, and so on.
I have no quibbles with this as much good and outstanding work is done every day using these approaches.
However, solving problems, regardless of approach, requires a kind of “download” of the problem space or solution space in order to make it accessible to be worked with.
This download reproduces the very factors in our mind or consciousness that maintains the problem.
You can try this out for size yourself by thinking right now on an appropriate but very tenacious problem you are dealing with these days.
And there it is.
If we assume that the solution space in some sense needs to be larger and wider than the problem space, a shift of awareness from problem space to solution space automatically widens our focus and the scope of possibilities we can entertain.
But imagine a much, much, much wider space powered by your infinite imagination that holds both the problem space and the solution space, and suddenly you have moved from the well-known shallow shores to the wide open uncharted waters.
Imagination work thus shifts our focus from problems and solutions to the generative power of this deepest and widest part of ourselves.
It expands our scope of possibilities far beyond the mere creation of solutions to well-known problems.
It makes solutions-generation much more powerful.
Our moving forward suddenly takes place in wide open waters in what almost seems to be a completely different world.
And our list of problems? Well, many problems tend to fall away as irrelevant, others are seen from much more empowering perspectives, still others are taken to a higher level of creative capacity. We may also shift our focus to different problems and challenges that are far more interesting and engaging.
So, in imagination work we don’t necessarily approach problems and challenges directly, although we could. Instead we expand the power and scope of our imagination gently and graciously to such a degree that the lives we live and anything that happens in them in time become transformed completely.
It is after all the infinite imagination in me and in you we are talking about.
It is truly magical.