Purpose-inspired poems & prose by Prof. Wayne Visser
Firing our imagination
I’m a great believer in the power of imagination - and not only its power, but its necessity, if we are to “make a dent in the universe”, as Steve Jobs put it. For what we cannot imagine, we cannot create. Einstein once said:
"Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution." - Albert Einstein
We are all grappling with these discombobulated times - full of disruptions and discoveries, breakdowns and breakthroughs, anxieties and aspirations. And in the midst of the chaos, many of us are trying to make a positive difference.
If I’ve learned one thing in my 30+ years of working in the sustainability movement, it is that we can’t scare people into change; we have to inspire them. We need innovation, which of course begins with creative ideas.
We also can’t rationalise our way out of our predicament. We need to engage the rightbrain as much as the left; and the heart as much as the head. That’s one of the reasons I use poetry and prose in my writing and professional speaking.
Flocking for change
Change does not happen predictably and incrementally, but with great leaps, tipping points and exponential curves. Most profoundly, we experience what Thomas Kuhn calls a “paradigm shift”. John Elkington invokes the power of “green swans”:
“Too often, Black Swans take you exponentially where you don’t want to go, whereas Green Swans take you exponentially where you do want to go. [They are] solutions that take us exponentially toward breakthrough.” - John Elkington
And how do we reach these moments of inflection? It comes down to seeding and cultivating social movements. And social movements coalesce around ideas, symbols and memes. These result in murmuration - a great flocking together.
What unites a movement is a common purpose, driven more often by a sense of meaning than a clever manifesto, fuelled by a flame of passion rather than a sterile policy, sustained by a call to action rather than wishful thinking.
Meaning and passion and invitations to act come in many forms. My experience as a writer of over 40 books and more than 600 poems (and counting) is that creative words, coded ideas and timeless parables resonate with some deep part of our being.
Redreaming the future
Collective imagination and social change rely on myths - archetypal symbols wrapped in stories. One of my favourite writers of poetry and prose is Ben Okri. He understands the power of stories and creativity to reimagine our world:
"The worst realities of our age are manufactured realities. It is therefore our task, as creative participants in the universe, to redream our world. The fact of possessing imagination means that everything can be re dreamed." - Ben Orki One thing we know about dreams is that they often defy logic. They are spontaneous and creative expressions of deeper currents in our psyche. While they may seem chaotic, it is unwise to simply dismiss them as nonsense.
Dreams are born in the dark, in the shadow of our unconsciousness, much like seeds germinate in fecund soils underground. Dreams are the invisible energy of life, the primordial spark of creation, and the harbingers of hope. tHrIVE Mind is my offering to redreaming the future; my pebble cast into the pond of collective imagination. I hope that the words will spark your own imagination, or strike a chord in the song of your heart.