A Vivid Imagination and Creative Visualization

Do you have a vivid imagination? Do you easily visualize scenes and conversations that go on and on? Do you do well at predicting what your family or friends will say in any given situation? Creative ideas drop from you like dandruff? Then you are blessed with a very special gift from God, a creative imagination.

You may have been told it is a curse, that it is a runaway imagination, and often it is said as if it is a dirty thing.

(In fact, there is a certain realm from which I stay far away, where a vivid imagination is considered a tool of the devil. I'm not going to the area of immoral fantasies). Let's stick to a discussion of a healthy, creative imagination. This is to do with a mind that can visualize scenes and conversations vividly and discern the thoughts and intentions of others.

Such creative visualization is required gear for a creative writer or a poet, or an artist. These gifted people cannot express a great idea or theme if they cannot first imagine or visualize it.

Isn't it odd that we encourage creative kids to express their ideas until those ideas go to areas we don't approve of, and then suddenly we start squelching their ideas? This proves that while an imagination is a gift from God, it needs to be trained and disciplined to produce good and godly things instead of the ugly and filthy.

Did you know that our imagination is not so much a work of our mind, as first of our spirit - that part that communes with God? A thought may be planted in our mind first, but truly inspired ideas come from our spirit in fellowship with God's Spirit. Next, our mind, and then our hands and mouth, are the means by which these ideas can be expressed, and it is our soul, the seat of our personality, that colours our ideas and makes them uniquely ours.

Ruthe's Vivid Imagination

I would like to introduce you to Ruthe, the main character in the novel, Ruthe's Secret Roses. She has a very creative, vivid imagination. - Very! This shows up repeatedly in how she can visualize with great clarity and detail what others may be thinking and feeling. It is almost as if she can hop into the other person's mind and see things through their eyes and thoughts. Some might call that having visions but this is unique. It is not prophetic so much as the ability to identify in her imagination with the other person's perspective. The wonderful thing is that she doesn't just live vicariously through others, but she has a strong sense of right and wrong and what solutions that other person needs.

Her scariest times are when she gets into a new situation and has nothing from past experiences or reading with which to tell what could happen next. However, because of the principles she believes in, she plunges in, expecting ideas and answers to show up when needed. (Her principles and courage lead to another topic we'll cover another time). An example shows up immediately in the first chapter where Ruthe drives around and around a block in the city, feeling certain that someone in that noisy place with the pulsating neon sign is in trouble.

She was also able to visualize at least two businesses for friends who needed jobs or careers. Darlin' Bonne caught the vision for the dress design shop, and Lloyd and his friends caught her vision for the unusual car dealership.

You can see that having a vivid imagination leads naturally to creative ideas and solutions, and in Ruthe's case, to a tremendous influence on the new friends she makes wherever she goes. Sometimes the ideas Ruthe offers turn out something far better than what she first imagined, and many good things came to her as a result.

Take for instance, when she suggested to Darlin Bonnie to picture in her mind what God might want for that difficult and angry high school teacher that came to tell her off and to get her to come back to school. Darlin' Bonne tried it, and was able to persuade the contrary woman to accept the changes that God would bring to her life. She was transformed inside. But then Betty invited Miss Shulton downstairs to join them for supper, and afterwards they took her upstairs to try some things that Lois and the other girls visualized. By the end of the evening they had transformed her appearance totally into a gorgeous, modern and winning younger woman. She became Phyllis to them, and they referred to this as the royal treatment, as they helped her prepare a whole new persona for school after that weekend.

When Phyllis went back to school the following Monday, her students did not recognize her!

Have you ever transformed in your imagination a teacher you didn't like? Perhaps in a negative, destructive way, but you should try using your imagination the way Ruthe does in Ruthe's Secret Roses.

Ruthe could imagine her friend June living in the greystone mansion with her siblings. Later, with her younger sister's help, she was able to see that place used for a Charm n' Poise course.

Ruthe's vivid imagination helps her to picture her city friends as various roses. She ties certain characteristics to the way she sees different colours and styles of roses. Darlin' Bonne is a passionate red rose, while Phyllis Shulton is a rare talisman rose (such as she finds behind the greystone mansion). It may have to do with the talisman having red and golden highlights such as Phyllis has in her new hair-style, but also because she recognizes the older woman as very unique.

As I said earlier, Ruthe often benefited from the things she initiated because of her adventurous imagination. Phyllis latched onto Ruthe as a dear friend from whom she could learn, and when she discovered Ruthe's creative writing potential, she set herself to helping Ruthe develop that talent. Don't we all wish we had friends who stimulate us on to grow and become much better at what we have latent in us?

What if you used your imagination more often to visualize better things for yourself and your family and friends? And then if you mustered courage to go ahead and try the first steps towards those things? Why, God would meet you and together you would see some miraculous things happen.

Ruthe, of Ruthe's Secret Roses, (free sample read at: )tempers her imagination with an intense spiritual or prayer life. In other words, they intermingle in her constantly, so that her prayers are coloured with her vivid imagination, and her imagination and creative ideas are affected by her prayers. She has a constantly running dialogue with Jesus, the Lover of her soul, her very Best Friend in the world. Everything she has learned about Him from earliest Sunday School days and from her daily Bible reading works together to create a fairly clear and consistent personality for Him. Though she knows that she should not try to turn Jesus into an imaginary friend. Ruthe knows that by her imagination she is able to perceive Him present in all the details of her life. It is easy for her to have a running conversation with Him at all times, so that any times she gets a chill of fear, she cries out to Him for help, and any time she gets an idea, she filters it for something He would have suggested to her. If it is a positive solution she goes with it and acts.

On the other hand, she knows that Satan likes to whisper thoughts of fear and discouragement to her, and when these thoughts come, she quickly rejects them, and denounces him. At least when she is alert enough to recognize the source.

I'm convinced that this aspect is what makes her imagination richer and and her life much more exciting than most people experience. Other people can have a vivid imagination as well, but it won't be expressed the same way.

Creative Visualization

Let me give you one more example from the book, Ruthe's Secret Roses, and then I'll let you discover more of that on your own, (Hint: you can read the first eight chapters at the link in this sentence), and turn to another line of thought about our imaginations and the right and wrong use of them.

Later in the book, Ruthe's friend Isabelle, who has been convinced all through her pregnancy that she would have twins, has just come through labour and things didn't turn out quite the way Isabelle had visualized. She had thought she was copying Ruthe's dramatic way of seeing and claiming good things, but now she was said to be in a terrible depression. As Ruthe goes down the hospital corridor to Isabelle's room, she finds herself getting into the depths of what Isabelle must be feeling - the shock the great disappointment in God.... and because Isabelle likes poetry, Ruthe's mind is soon writing some lines of poetry as she imagines Isabelle thinking in a dialogue with God.

Ruthe finds Isabelle's back turned to her, unspeaking, and totally cold in attitude. So Ruthe softly begins to quote the poem started in her imagination moments ago. That was exactly what Isabelle needed to hear. She clings to Ruthe and weeps out the bottled up emotions in her heart. It was the start of her healing.

Now if you think that couldn't happen, your imagination needs some development. True, it doesn't happen often in this current lifestyle we see around us.

But to my way of thinking, if I can imagine it, then it is possible. It could happen.

We hear often enough that when kids have watched too much violence on TV they begin to think that way and next thing we know, they have attempted a crime such as they saw, and which inspired their imagination.

How My Vivid Imagination Multiplied

Yes, a vivid imagination is a gift from God. By itself it is amoral, but it is a tool in our hands, and it can be used for good or for evil. It all depends on the spirit and the intentions of the person using it. If your heart and mind is in tune with God, as is Ruthe's in the novel, that imagination becomes a tool for much good and a way to help people become transformed wonderfully. If your heart and mind is bitter and angry and filled with sin, the ideas that will come out if you exercise your imagination will be ugly and cruel and sadistic. I would not like to encourage that at all.

When I was about 13, I was sitting in church, hearing a sermon about the servants given talents by the master. In Bible times a talent was a coin of currency, however, the English word lends itself well to referring also to the skills and abilities we have. Pastor Stoesz was describing various talents we might have that we should use so they would multiply for God's kingdom. He did not list any that I thought I had. But I found myself praying and telling the Lord, that if He thought my imagination was a talent that counted, then I'd happily use it to serve and glorify Him.

My life went on, and I didn't give it much thought. I'm used to having passing conversations with the Lord like that, and I don't expect Him to answer all my chatter. Sometimes I just talk to Him because I need someone to hear me, and I need to express my thoughts so I know what they are. However, about a decade later, when I was busy with a Pioneer Girls Club in a church in London, Ontario, I was teaching this same lesson to "my girls" and suddenly realized that - sure enough, God had multiplied my imagination. Because I had used it in my club work and in decorating in the church, and organizing and planning club events, (and was secretly writing my novel at home), and because the church had given me more and more responsibilities, that one talent had now become half a dozen other skills; leadership, teaching, administration, writing, creativity with crafts, mentoring... I was flabbergasted!

Of course, I like to give God all the glory and credit for any good ideas I have, and for any good that has been accomplished in the lives of others because of what I've visualized or imagined and then suggested or done. I'm learning to value this gift as a precious treasure.

In fact, sometimes I call it my 'Ruby in my pocket.' My vivid imagination is a rare and special thing dedicated to the Lord, but there are times I yield to the temptation to entertain myself with it. When I'm exhausted from some hours of hard physical work, I have no greater treat than to sit back in my recliner, (or in the bathtub in the mornings), and allow my mind to wander. I can visualize detailed stories in my imagination. It is like watching videos without need of a screen that has to be plugged in. It is in full colour, with stereo sound. I can backup and edit a scene at will, even if the room is dark.

Imagine my shock when I read one day that when writers do this it is called Empire Building in our minds. So I confess that I can easily build whole dynasties of family history, and detailed relationships and conversations.

Creative Ideas

If you are a creative writer, and want to develop truly creative ideas, you are going to need to develop your ability to visualize people and scenes and places and make them come alive for others. Even if your first efforts are not all you hoped they would be, keep working at it. The more you use this mental and spiritual muscle the more developed and effective it will be. Do not be afraid to over-produce. With today's computers, you can always sort and delete later.

Of course, I personally would recommend that you find a relaxing position and then talk over your ideas with the Lord Jesus in prayer. If you always defer and relate to Him with respect You will find that He prompts some of your ideas, and your grasp of God's commands will help filter out the bad ideas - or at least help you to recognize the good from the bad creative ideas. The more often you do this, the better.

Is there then no down-side to having a vivid imagination?

I'm afraid so. It takes great self-discipline to get any work done, or even to focus on a task that is unrelated. A run-away imagination is the bane of my life. I have to be continually pulling on it's reins, and bringing it back in line so that I can accomplish the work I've set before myself. Especially now that I'm running a business, and I must put in quality hours for clients as well, as develop the web businesses born out of my busy imagination.

I'm grateful now that God has not handed me everything on a platter, or made everyone easy to get along with. He has used those things to develop balance and wisdom, and self-discipline. They have acted like a jeweler's tumbler or chisel to chip off the rough edges and polish up more facets on the sparkling ruby, which is the gift of my vivid imagination.

Naturally, my imagination is always under construction and growing and improving along with my relationship to the Lord. I've learned to accept and appreciate this unique gift, and although I know we are all different, and do not need to be carbon copies of one another, if you are open to receiving it, I would wish and pray that God would give you this gift of imagination too, and that you would develop and use it wisely.

Would you like to meet my heroine, Ruthe Veer of the novel, Ruthe's Secret Roses?

START READING, Ruthe's Secret Roses right away!

The first eight chapters are free and online.

You will;

be spiritually impacted;

be challenged to draw closer to Jesus, and see Him as a REAL Friend!

enjoy a clean story with a creative and feminine Christian environment and atmosphere

feel that Ruthe has become a life-long friend of yours!

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