Imagination Transformation!

I’d like to tell you a story about my daughter – a wonderful young lass – who even though having just had her eighth birthday late last year, she is well and truly going on 15! She is learning so much, so quickly, sometimes it is hard to keep up.

When she was a toddler, one of her favourite television shows was a Disney animated series called “Little Einsteins”. The premise of the show was that Leo and his sister Annie, with their two friends June and Quincy, would go on missions to save lost animals, or characters from stories. Each episode featured a well known piece of classical music and a famous piece of art or art style.

As you can see, my wife and I appreciated this show (I’m not sure if it still available on the Disney Channel) because it introduced real world elements to fictional and educational stories.

There was however one element of the show that has supported and affected my daughter’s thinking more than anything else in the show. There was a technique the team used to change the way they were thinking about a problem, or to change something that was scary – and you may already have guessed (from the title of the post), they would all call out in unison “Imagination Transformation”.

Within moments they would change big and confronting characters into fluffy rabbits, change the foreboding music into a well loved nursery rhyme and if there was something in particular they needed to achieve, the team would make that goal easier to reach.

Now this is a very simple concept to employ, and there has been many times over the years I have visited my daughter in her bedroom in the middle of the night after she has had a nightmare, and I would guide her through the process of changing the picture of her dream – the representation of what took place – and make it funny and silly or calm and peaceful.

All of a sudden, her mindset would change. The dark creature in the shadows of a dimly lit playground with the sound of heavy footsteps was turned into a little colourful butterfly, floating on a cool sunlit breeze with Greig’s “Peer Gynt – Morning” softly supporting the butterfly’s wings as it flittered about. And – within minutes my daughter would fall asleep with a smile on her face.

Earlier this week, we were talking about her day, and she said “Dad, I wish you could teach Joanne (a friend) how to do “Imagination Transformation”… she’s always upset or sad about something!”

It got me to thinking about how we as adults could sometimes use the power of “Imagination Transformation”, not to simply hide the bad things away and sweep them under the rug never having to deal with them again, but more to be able to move on until we are in a more resourceful mood and in a position of better dealing with what is getting us down, or angry.

Rather than moaning about the way things are, or always speaking with negativity to those around us, let’s either deal with it, get it done and move on, or take the time to focus on something positive, something that lifts our spirits so that we may move forward to a point where we can have a stronger position in dealing with those shadows.

Why not give it a try? Next time you notice you are reacting negatively towards something – make a choice… either fix it and move on, or transform it so that you can move on positively for the time being, and deal with it when you are better prepared later.

My daughter swears by it!

Live Your Ultimate Life.