“The emerging model of cognition is as a sustained act of imagination, and therefore continuously active participation in the consensual hallucination of reality.”
—Kris Saknussemm ( Write what you know–and be sorry) The Writer Magazine May 2010, author of the novels, Private Midnight and Zanesville
What if everything we experience in life is truly the occurrence of a dream, that our living is in essence, one small part of larger reality, the life and time of someone outside of us, or a person whose life surrounds, encompasses and holds that of ours?
What if the decisions we make, the actions we carry out are predetermined by those, past and present of this person?
What if we are but an aspect or one dimension of the terrain of the personality held by another?
What if the joy we experience in our dream is the nightmare some else is experiencing?
When does our madness become or stir another person’s joy?
A sustained act of imagination, if held and extended long enough, can become the rough draft of a book, a painting or a piece of music.
Recent developments in technology and the Internet make recording, and saving the ramblings of our imagination involving words and music relatively straightforward.
They also simplify the practical tasks of refining our words–typing and saving drafts.
But how do we sustain or remain connected to the spark if creativity that started us on the way?
How do we use our imagination, what role does it play in helping us to revision our stories and novels from the rough forms in which they first present to the refined and edited versions that entertain readers?
To accomplish this we must begin with our selves.
The imaginative source from which any creation emerges demands further engagement to assist in capturing the ultimate vision and scope of the work.
We cannot stop thinking upon and pondering a work on completing that first draft.
We must continue to ask questions, brainstorm, and visualize must continue throughout the refinement and editing of each.
The writer must read through her or his work several times, making changes, scribbling notes, straightening out awkward sentences, breaking up or expanding and then clarifying confusing paragraphs.
We must read like both a reader who has never seen the work and a writer who knows some of the story, but who reaches to uncover more.
Each draft of revision reveals deeper layers of the story within the narrative, a mosaic whose end and roots lie within the well-spring of our creativity–the human imagination, what the best computers and all the latest Internet developments can never emulate or replace.
How do you feed and/or stimulate your imagination?
What role does imagination play in revising and editing your works?
How does access to the Internet affect your imagination?
Do you find instances where using the computer hinders your ability to think out of the box?
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