How to Liberate Your Imagination

Scripture — 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 (NRSV)

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

Devotion

In 2006, world-renowned educator Sir Ken Robinson gave a TED talk entitled, “Do schools kill creativity?” He did indeed argue that the typical educational system hinders if not smothers creativity in students. For Robinson, this was a matter of grave concern because creativity is so important, not only to individuals, but also to our world. As he explained, “So I want to talk about education, and I want to talk about creativity. My contention is that creativity now is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status.”

Robinson’s TED talk touched a chord with online viewers. In fact, “Do schools kill creativity?” is the most-watched TED talk of all time, with over 75,000,000 views and counting. Millions of people are apparently concerned, not only about our educational systems but also about helping people, themselves included, to be more creative. With all the challenges facing us today, don’t we need more creativity in ourselves, our families, our businesses, our schools, our communities, our churches, and our world?

Some would answer this question by saying that creativity is not something you can get more of. As Robinson writes in his book Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative, “It is often thought that people are either born creative or not, just as they may have blue or brown eyes, and there’s not much anyone can do about it.” Robinson disputes this common assumption, observing, “The fact is, there is a lot you can do to help yourself, and other people, become more creative.”

We sense intuitively that creativity is somehow related to imagination. Robinson puts it this way, “Imagination is the source of our creativity, but imagination and creativity are not the same thing. Imagination is the ability to bring to mind things that are not present to our senses. Creativity is putting your imagination to work” (82). Eric Liu and Scott Noppe-Brandon, in Imagination First, concur with Robinson about the distinction and close relationship between creativity and imagination. Yet they affirm the superlative importance of imagination over creativity and innovation: “We believe that of the three elements, imagination is foundational and the most important, and demands proportionate attention. Imagination is the sine qua non. Without a healthy and well-fed imagination, there is no creativity or innovation” (pp. 19-20).

Liu and Noppe-Brandon also agree with Robinson about the possibility of growing our imaginations. In Imagination First they outline 29 different practices that, they believe, encourage and expand our capacity for imagination. Similarly, Scott Barry Kaufman and Carolyn Gregoire, authors of Wired to Create: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Creative Mind, highlight “Ten Things Highly Creative People Do Differently.” If you and I engage in these activities, according to Kaufman and Gregoire, then we will become more creative.

I know I would like to become more creative in life and work. I expect you feel similarly. According to the experts, this is not only possible, but also likely if we engage in practices that liberate rather than constrain our imaginations. In several upcoming Life for Leaders devotions I want to examine some of these practices, offering biblical reflection on them, as you would expect.

I begin such reflection today. I believe a passage in 2 Corinthians helps us to imagine (yes, pun intended) how God might liberate our imaginations from the constraints of our enculturation, including our educational systems. 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 reads, “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.”

I admit that Paul is not writing an essay on imagination here. But what he says about the Holy Spirit seems relevant to our consideration of redemptive imagination. Notice what is included in these two short verses: the Holy Spirit, freedom, and imagination (seeing with our minds what we cannot yet see with our eyes). It seems clear that the Spirit gives us the freedom to use our imaginations so that we might “see” both the glory of the Lord and how we are beginning to reflect that glory. If this is true, then wouldn’t it also be possible that the Holy Spirit, through renewing our minds (Romans 12:2), would also give us the freedom to imagine other things as well? We might imagine a world in which God’s justice is more prevalent, in which people love their neighbors and even their enemies, in which broken things and people are being made whole by God’s grace, etc.

No matter the particular challenges you’re facing today, whether at work or at home, in your relationships or in your community, in your leadership or your discipleship, God’s Spirit is at work in you, helping to liberate your imagination so that you might live and lead with greater freedom, vision, fruitfulness, and joy.

Banner image by Sascha Bosshard on Unsplash.

Find all Life for Leaders devotions here. Explore what the Bible has to say about work at the unique website of our partners, the Theology of Work Project’s online commentary. Reflection on today’s Life for Leaders theme can be found here: A Genuine Reputation (2 Corinthians 3).

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