When a new idea comes to mind (if it doesn’t slip from the mind before we write it down), our first impulse may be to shove it aside because it is strange. Acting on this impulse, we may de¬velop the habit of rejecting new ideas. Yet life is interesting to us in terms of the ideas we have.

Those who make scientific discoveries give new ideas a “fighting chance.” They test out their ideas with experiments to find out which ones will work and which ones will not work, and how worthwhile they are.

As we behave toward our own ideas, we behave toward the ideas suggested by others. When someone makes a suggestion, our first reaction may be to knock it down—not examine it carefully and ask questions about it.

Yet it may be good policy to listen carefully to what others are saying once in a while, and try to figure out what they mean. Perhaps we should ask them to elaborate on their ideas. The new idea that sounds silly at first may prove to be very significant on closer examination or if put to a practical test. We tend to give strange ideas, like strange people, the brush-off.

We can block off a new idea by saying, “Don’t clutter up my mind. I have too much to worry about without this intrusion.”

When we are upset and think we have too much on our minds, we may have too little on our minds. We may be allowing one worry or grievance to dominate our attention. We may be frantically warding off the very ideas that would help us most in solving our problems and putting our worries to rout. When we are worried we are in darkness. We need to open the door of our minds and let the sunlight in.
As it is good to accept ideas, it is good to accept people.

The reasons we provide to explain “why” things happen the way they do are supplied by our imaginations. The standards by which we judge ourselves and others are also products of our imaginations. Therefore, we should train our imaginations to be lively and to see things from more than just one point of view. We should conduct experiments and test things out in reality.

It is important to realize that the imagination can be trained. It can be trained to be constructive, rather than destructive, and optimistic, rather than pessimistic. We can tell our eyes to look for things they did not see before, and our ears to hear things they did not hear before.

The standards by which we judge others are of major importance. A person may seem “great” or “ignoble” to us, according to elements in his life that we arbitrarily single out. When we train ourselves to look at people with some objectivity, and from more than just one point of view, we become capable of seeing things we did not see before—virtues as well as vices.

What other people think about us is also important. It is good that others should have lively and constructive imaginations. They too should be willing to conduct experiments and test things out in reality.

I may want them to see my good points as well as my failings. If a person thinks I am a failure, everything I do or say may prove more conclusively to him that I am a failure. I suffer because of the limitations of his imagination.

When he begins to see my behavior from a slightly different angle, and to observe what is really taking place, he may be more fair-minded in judging me. He may recognize in me things that meet his approval. He may even want to follow my example in some things.

I am not in the light as long as my neighbor is in the dark. All people have a right to be accurately and fully informed.

It takes imagination to realize that we face many problems, not just a few, and that our problems are complicated and inter-related with those our neighbors, near and far, are trying to solve. An example of a major problem that we have in common with all mankind is the securing of international peace. Another problem is: How can we expand, rather than restrict, individual and group freedom? When the group does not cherish freedom, the individual can not be very free.

When our imagination is “twisted,” it enables us to think up reasons why we should not do, or can’t do, the things we would earnestly like to do. It helps us to defeat our higher purposes. We may have good intentions, but a faulty imagination will set up obstacles to carrying out these intentions. It may convince us to retreat when we should advance. It may also convince us to go ahead and do things that will hurt ourselves and others when we should not do them.

A twisted imagination may also motivate us to interfere with the freedom of others to express what they believe.

We need to assert control over our imaginations, so that we are the masters and not the slaves of what imagination can conjure up for us. We can direct our imaginative energies along constructive lines by checking our thoughts and keeping them in line with realities, and attempting to predict the results of our actions. We can focus our imagination on problems of major significance. This is far better than letting our imaginations run “hog wild,” filling our minds with doubts, fears, hostilities, negative attitudes and despair. We can make our imagination our friend, not our foe.

The delayed reaction is perhaps the first step in the learning process. If all our reactions were “instinctive,” mechanical, in¬flexible, we would perhaps have little choice or “free will.”

We make use of our “free will” when we delay our reactions and take time to consider several courses of action and not just one. We may try to foresee which course of action is likely to bring about the most desirable results. We may ask, “Will others benefit from this decision as well as I?”

When we “jump at conclusions” and assume that there is only one way to act, or that we know it all to begin with, we fail to delay our reactions. We may also fail to make use of our free wills. It may be good occasionally to wait for second, third, and perhaps better thoughts to come to us. We can attempt to find out through experiment which thoughts are most closely in conformity with reality.

When we take time to think things over, we open up our minds to new observations and impressions. We look around and observe what is actually before us. Our problems may suddenly be revealed to us in a new light. That which was uninteresting may suddenly become fascinating.

An unfamiliar situation may call for a new type of response, a new way of thinking. We discover that we can deliberately delay our reactions until we think up several courses of action, not just one. We merely have to look around and discover something new, or we may ask people to give up their views. Then we are more free to select a course of action that we honestly believe will be the most beneficial.

When we do not do this, we may merely be choosing the lesser of two evils. Freedom involves the right to select the course of action that we believe is positively good.
We do not want to be forced to accept the either-or alternatives offered to us by others, when both alternatives seem undesirable.

Our ideas are supplied by our imaginations. Therefore, it is good to have a wholesome, active and optimistic imagination—one that will supply us with a wealth of ideas and alternatives from which to choose. The lively imagination is one that is in contact with “facts” and people, and is not excessively word-oriented.

As it is important for an individual to be imaginative, optimistic, resourceful, and free to select the best from several courses of action, it is good for a group to be similarly imaginative, optimistic, resourceful and free. A group needs constructive leadership backed up by an enlightened and well-informed membership. Small groups need to be independent of pressures that might be exerted on them by larger and stronger groups.

The individual’s imagination and his freedom of will are tied up with the imagination and freedom of his neighbors, and of the groups to which he belongs, even the groups to which he does not belong.

We have the capacity of “looking at ourselves from the outside,” so to speak. We can detach ourselves from our immediate concerns and ask, “How am I doing?” We can evaluate our actions. “Is it necessary for me to continue in the old-fashioned, mechanical and uncritical way of thinking and feeling?”

Just as we go back and forth from home to the job every day, seldom getting off the beaten path, we may keep thinking the same old thoughts and feeling the same old feelings, which are likely to be fearful, hostile, discouraged, and self-pitying ones.

However, we can enrich our lives by thinking along new lines, feeling new things, developing new interests, studying new subjects, looking at familiar objects from a new point of view, etc. We can become adventurers in the realm of ideas.
This can be accomplished largely through the use of words.

If we carry our ideas m our heads all the time, we are likely to be burdened by them and to think in circles. It may be helpful to write down our thoughts as they come to mind. When we write down what is going on, we are in a sense “liberated” from the burden of our thoughts. We can express one idea today and then go ahead and express a more complex or more subtle idea tomorrow. We can, through the careful use of words, travel far and discover new things.

And we can also tinker with reality and observe what is going on. And as we observe more carefully and think more meaningfully, the words we use to describe ourselves and what we perceive as real will change.

Writing is a process of “time binding” with words. It enables us to travel from the past into the future, from the familiar to the unfamiliar, from the simple to the complex. Of course, our words must be checked with realities as we go along.

We can make progress in self-discovery by being less “self-centered” than we used to be. Many of us are excessively self-centered. We do not develop our capacities as extensively as we should. We do not take a deep interest in what other people do, think, feel, and believe. However, if we have the support and encouragement of others and show a deep concern for their personal problems, we are likely to be stimulated to develop our own hidden talents more adequately, and to be of greater help to others.