Imagination, creativity, happiness
“I don’t like emotions… For some reason I’m more comfortable in imaginary circumstances.” actor William H. Macy
One of the primary tools of a creative person is imagination. But in his new book “Stumbling on Happiness” Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert proposes that imagination may directly impact our sense of happiness in limiting or distorting ways.
Meghan Daum writes in her recent column “Goodbye to you, Mr. Smiley” [Los Angeles Times, May 20, 2006] that the book suggests “happiness is largely an anticipatory experience… we spend much of our time not so much experiencing pleasure as thinking about future pleasure and taking steps to ensure its attainment.”
She thinks “the 21st century cultural preoccupation with happiness [is] peer pressure of the most toxic variety… For those whose happiness standards exceed the reach of besotted emoticons, a prescription for a serotonin reuptake inhibitor has become the thinking man’s smiley face… But considering the intangible nature of happiness, the inherent ephemeralness of it, the difficulty, even, of defining it, it bears asking why we’re so focused on it.”
Why indeed. Certainly many creative people do suffer from depression, anxiety and other mood disorders that disable creative expression [see the section on Depression and Creativity] but happiness - or even contentment - may not be such a worthwhile goal for a creative person, and reliance on imagination for defining life value can be distorting.
In his review of “Stumbling on Happiness” Malcolm Gladwell [author of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking] notes that “We’re far too accepting of the conclusions of our imaginations. Our imaginations aren’t particularly imaginative. Our imaginations are really bad at telling us how we will think when the future finally comes. And our personal experiences aren’t nearly as good at correcting these errors as we might think.”
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May 24th, 2006 at 6:15 am
“Our imaginations are really bad at telling us how we will think when the future finally comes. And our personal experiences aren’t nearly as good at correcting these errors as we might think.”
I think it depends on how one defines “imagination.” My imagination provides me with all kinds of grand visions of possibilities. (Like the Robert Kennedy-appropriated quote from George Bernard Shaw, “I see things that never were and ask, why not?”)
But I also have an “internal critic” that tells me all the reasons why I shouldn’t pursue this dream or that one, why I should be more realistic and less of a dreamer.
Do I choose to listen to the internal critic and rob my self of the chance to chase my dreams? No. I chase my dreams and, by doing so, find that some of them at least, can, in fact, come true!