Although imagination is the driving force of creativity, it is often degraded by the "practical", "down-to-earth" members of society. "You must be imagining things!" "It's only your imagination." We don't need less imagination; we need a great deal more of it. But like any faculty, you need to exercise your imagination in order to keep it robust and vital. Otherwise it becomes submerged under the tyranny of "the way things are." You must adopt a playful attitude, a willingness to fool around with ideas, with the understanding that many of these fanciful notions will not be relevant or practical. But some will, and these creative insights can lead to profound and wondrous discoveries. At the same time, cultivating a creative attitude stretches your imagination and makes your life vibrant and unique. "The quality of the imagination is to flow," the writer Ralph Waldo Emerson observed. When you are living creatively, you aren't "going with the flow": You are the flow.

Having learned to trust the creative process, diminish the voice of negative judgement in your mind, establish a creative environment, and commit yourself to trusting your creative gifts, you are now in a position to live more creatively. How do you actually do this? Start small. Identify some patterns in your life and break out of them. Choose new experiences whenever possible - for example, trying unfamiliar items on a menu or getting to know people outside of your friends - and strive to develop fresh perspectives on things in your life. Resist falling back into the ruts you were previously in by remembering that living things are supposed to be continually growing, changing, and evolving, not acting in repetitive patterns like machines. Choosing to live creatively may be one of the most fulfilling decisions that you make, a choice that will enhance the quality of your life and your personal development as well.