Imagination in psychology. Wallace's four-stage model of the creative process

Imagination is the most important part of our life. Imagine for a moment that a person would not have a fantasy. We would be deprived of almost all scientific discoveries and works of art, images created by the greatest writers and inventions of designers. Children would not hear fairy tales and would not be able to play many games.

Thanks to the imagination, a person creates, intelligently plans his activities and manages them. Almost all human material and spiritual culture is a product of people's imagination and creativity. Images of the imagination are not something special, inherent only in art or the creative process, they are part of our everyday life.

Simply put - deprive a person of fantasy, and progress will stop! So imagination, fantasy are the most necessary human ability. It should contribute to a better knowledge of the surrounding world, self-disclosure and self-improvement of the individual, and not develop into passive daydreaming, replacing real life with dreams. In all these cases, imagination plays a positive role, but there are other types of imagination. These include dreams, hallucinations, daydreams and daydreams.

dreams can be attributed to the category of passive and involuntary forms of imagination. Their true role in human life has not yet been established, although it is known that in a person’s dreams many vital needs are expressed and satisfied, which, for a number of reasons, cannot be realized in life.

hallucinations called fantastic visions, which, apparently, have almost no connection with the reality surrounding a person. Usually, they, being the result of certain mental disorders or the functioning of the body, accompany many painful conditions.

dreams , unlike hallucinations, is a completely normal mental state, which is a fantasy associated with desire.

dream called a form of special internal activity, which consists in creating an image of what a person would like to implement. A dream differs from a dream in that it is somewhat more realistic and more connected with reality, i.e. in principle feasible. Dreams occupy a fairly large part of a person's time, especially in youth, and for most people they are pleasant thoughts about the future, although some have disturbing visions that give rise to feelings of anxiety and aggressiveness. The process of imagination is rarely immediately realized in the practical actions of a person, so a dream is important condition realization of the creative powers of man. The necessity of a dream lies in the fact that, being initially a simple reaction to a highly exciting situation, it then often becomes an internal need of the individual. The dream is very important even in primary school age. The younger the dreaming child, the more often his dreaming does not so much express its direction as it creates it. This is the formative function of the dream.

Imagination images have different aspects that are important to us:

First aspect All people have the power of imagination. The images presented by man do not come from somewhere, they are an impulse, a movement of the human body, a natural manifestation of life.

The ability of a person to create images of imagination conceals the chance to create images of himself during therapy, images of his problems, his thoughts, his feelings, his body, social relationships, his fears and desires, as well as to change existing pictures. You can imagine the processes taking place in your body, its power and resources, the ability to recover (for example, good blood supply to a sore spot). You can imagine your pain, its shape, color, activity. By changing this image, you can change the intensity of pain and temporarily (perhaps for a long time) soothe the pain.

Second aspect lies in the fact that the imagination deals with the past as well as with the present and future. People remember the history of their lives, looking with an inner eye at the pictures emerging from the past.

These pictures are not objective - people create, produce them both from their memories, from thoughts, knowledge about what happened in the past, from their emotional memory, from the memory of the body and memories of social contacts. "Memory is a complex thing, a relative of truth, but not its twin."

The fact that images of the imagination refer to the present is a matter of course everyday experience. We see things with our own eyes, but we also see things with our inner eye, we can imagine, for example, the image of our heart, even if we have never seen it with our own eyes.

A person can also imagine a picture of his future. Can create in my mind an image of my aspirations and desires, my professional future, my next vacation… We can imagine a picture of the future, and this picture can help us decide if I can even steer for this future, is it right for me, will it be for me reality or not. First, a person has an image, and then he brings it to life. And this third aspect imagination.

“I am in no hurry to start practical work. When I have an idea, I immediately start building a device in my imagination. I am redesigning, making improvements, and in my brain I put this device into action. And it makes absolutely no difference to me whether I run my turbine in my mind or test it in my workshop. I can even notice that its balance has been disturbed. However, there is no difference in the results. So I quickly develop new concept and I can perfect it without touching anything. And as soon as I reach the stage where I have made every possible improvement I could think of in the invention, and when I no longer see any flaws anywhere, only then do I embody in a concrete form the product of my imagination. Nikola Tesla

Tesla's strategy bears a striking resemblance to the strategy described by Mozart, who claimed that he first composed the music in his head, and then, when it was ready, simply "copied" it on paper (see The Strategies of Geniuses, Volume 1). Mozart wrote that he saw music with his mind's eye in such a way that it was " almost complete and complete in my brain, so that I could see it as a beautiful picture or statue... Therefore, the transfer to paper is quite fast, because, as I said, everything is already finished by this point; and what is written on paper very rarely differs from what was in my imagination.”(E. Holmes. Life of Mozart, including his correspondence).

However, our verbal communication- and this fourth aspect imagination is always filled with images, countless images.

Good literature is distinguished by the fact that when we read a novel, a talented poem, or listen to some interesting story, images arise in us. And these are not the images that were invented by the authors, but these are our own images. For example, if two people are talking about the sea, then both will have an image of one or another particular sea, and not the four-letter word "sea".

Each person creates his own image of the sea. This makes communication possible and at the same time complicates and confuses it. When, during therapy, couples talk about love and share their ideas about living together, about trust, about their worries, strong desires, about sexuality, both often use the same words, but the images behind these words are different for each ... everyone is in some other “movie”.

One of the tasks of therapy is to try to convey to another person your images - ideas, to learn how to translate them into the language of the interlocutor.

The fruits of the imagination are everywhere, they are an integral part of our world. They are part of our being.

Imagination, its products must be given a place, they must be taken seriously and respected. The way in which a person expresses his images in this moment: in words, in a drawing, in a clay sculpture or in a dance, - is of secondary importance.

The main thing is that these images find their expression. Imagination and its creative expression are not only a means to an end, but an end in themselves.

If clients express images of their imagination, the fruits of their fantasies and take them seriously, this means that they take themselves seriously.

When a person forms his fantasies in a drawing, picture or other object, he pays his attention to what was previously only on the edge of his attention, he can observe it, take a certain position in relation to it and change it.

Albert Einstein said that imagination is the greatest creative force. Look at those words again: "great creative power." Imagination! Not education! Not money! No luck!

Napoleon Hill, author of Think and Grow Rich, says that fantasy is the most amazing, miraculous, incomprehensibly powerful force in the world. Before dismissing this idea as crazy, you should know that Mr. Hill was an adviser to two American presidents, received a commission from the rich Andrew Carnegie to teach people to achieve their dreams, and received many thanks from the greatest people all over the world, whom he helped to succeed.

Imagination is the force that will take you to places where you have never been.

Henry Ford relied on imagination and faith. Walt Disney said that if he didn't see Disneyland in his mind, the rest of the world wouldn't see it on Earth. Bill Gates imagined his products before they were real software on which we are working. It should be remembered that many of the great men in the world started from scratch and built empires. They dreamed. And the universe embodied the experience of their imagination. The universe always creates real experience from imagination, whatever it is.

Sometimes people come to therapy whose imaginations are weak and unviable. Those numerous people who are afraid or even afraid to express their fantasies and share them with other people. Some clients do not have the ability to create internal images, the ability to represent something is not developed. It manifests itself in them, only in night dreams in the form of fragmentary pictures. Sometimes they occasionally have spontaneous phantom images that are elusive and transient. Clients get very upset when they notice in themselves this process of fading their imagination.

The sources of such extinctions are various. But if he (the client) is ready to explore new paths with the therapist and move forward, then it is possible - often very slowly and gradually - to nurture this ability to create in him again.

How to develop and maintain your imagination?

Leonardo noted that “the gift of the imagination is both a rudder and a bridle for the senses” (B. Fogli Volume 2. Leonardo’s Notebooks) and gave exercises specially designed to stimulate and mobilize internal cognitive processes in relation to visual impressions. Let's take the following exercise from his treatise on painting as an example:

Way of inciting the mind to various inventions

“I will not refrain from presenting for your consideration a new method, which, although it may seem trivial and almost ludicrous, is nevertheless very useful in stimulating the mind to various inventions.

It is this: if you look at walls covered with different stains or made from a mixture of different types of stones, and if you want to think of a certain scene, you can see on this wall a resemblance to different landscapes, decorated with mountains, rivers, rocks, trees, plains, wide valleys and groups of various hills. You will also be able to make out various battles and figures in rapid motion, and strange expressions on faces, and costumes from distant lands, and an infinite number of things that you can then reduce to separate and well-defined forms. When looking at such walls and a mixture of different stones, the same thing happens as when listening to bells: in their ringing you can hear any imaginary name and any word.

(MS. 2038 Bib.Nat.22v)

As Leonardo himself pointed out, such a seemingly trivial or pointless mental exercise can be very important.

How to make an imaginary animal seem real

“You know that you cannot create an animal without it having [features or] parts that do not bear a resemblance to the features of other animals. Therefore, if you want to make any of the animals you have invented seem real - let's say it is a dragon - take the head of a mastiff or setter, the eyes of a cat, the ears of a porcupine, the nose of a hound, the eyebrows of a lion, the temples of an old rooster and the neck of a water turtle .

In this case, Leonardo explicitly uses the strategy of identifying, internalizing and combining key features in order to construct something in his imagination; this process is opposite to the process of creating maps of information coming from sensory sensations. Leonardo uses a strategy very similar to research human face in their grotesque drawings; he cuts, pastes and glues different elements taken from his memory and imagination in order to create a mosaic of features that would look like real.

“This seems to have been a strategy that Leonardo successfully applied during his career as an artist.

Vasari (1550), for example, mentions that when Leonardo was still a young apprentice (in the workshop of the famous master Verrocchio), his father, Sir Piero, was given a shield made by one of his peasants. Sir Piero took it to Leonardo in Florence and asked him to draw something on it. Leonardo “began to think about what he could draw on it that would frighten the enemy, like the head of Medusa. For this purpose, Leonardo brought into the room, into which no one but him entered, lizards, newts, crickets, snakes, butterflies, grasshoppers, bats and other strange animals; from them he formed an ugly monster, terrible and frightening, which emitted a poisonous breath and turned the air into flames…” his father. Sir Pierrot was greatly amazed and recoiled in surprise, not realizing at once that he saw before him a shield, or even just a drawn form; Leonardo supported his father by saying: “This work serves the purpose for which it was conceived; pick it up and take it with you; it has exactly the effect it should have.” All this seemed to Sir Piero like a miracle, and he praised Leonardo for his extraordinary ingenuity.

(André Chastel. The genius of Leonardo da Vinci. New York, 1961)

If you start with one image, even a very simple one, “blurry and hard to see”, you can eventually fix it in such a way that it “does not float away”. For example, close your eyes and look at the images that arise on their own. You may find it easier to remember the faces of loved ones, a favorite movie character, an emotionally charged past, a special vacation spot, a sunset, your car, or just a household item. If you get such a picture, even if at first it is very fuzzy and fuzzy, keep coming back to it and try to add more depth, detail and color.

I have worked with many people who initially claimed they couldn't visualize. One of the first questions I asked them was, “If you could visualize, what would you see?” For example: “If you could visualize a large ball hanging in front of you, what would it look like if you could see it?” Most people then start to respond: “Well, it would be red and round, about this distance from me…” and so on.

Sometimes, when helping a person learn to visualize, I say, “Let's start with something simple, and then we'll 'zoom in'. Let's create an image of a balloon." After he imagines a balloon or some other simple object, we add another balloon, and then another one until the person can create an image of a garland of pyramid-shaped balloons or some other composite image. In other cases, I may ask the person to start with a vague, blurry image or outline of a person, and then ask them to look at details, such as the buttons on a shirt.

Then we complicate the details themselves, or by adding details to the image. You can say: “Well, if you saw this ball in front of you, then where would the shadow be? Where would the light source be? In order to see something in external reality, light is needed. The same principle applies to our internal images. When they find the shadow, it becomes much easier for them to see the object itself.

What follows is a recording of a meditation that will help people apply Tesla's strategies in visualizing and creating new visions of the future.

Position your body comfortably and relaxed. Sit in a position that will really help you dream. If your body could put you in a state where you could truly set free your dreamer, how would you sit? Where would your head be? How would you breathe? Where in your body would you feel muscle tension?

If you could truly dream, what would your inner voice sound like? Would he be excited or whispering? Or would it just be a sound? Maybe he would encourage you or ask you questions? Or maybe he sounded very confident? Tune your inner voice to the tone that will help you dream, lead you to dreams.

And then start visualizing a dream of a certain kind. The dream of the entire planet. If you could come up with a wonderful dream for the entire planet, what would it be? And since it's just a dream, you don't have to worry about whether it's possible, feasible. Dream freely. If you could come up with your own version of a utopia, what would you see? How could technology fit into this global dream of the entire planet? And what about the war? How would you teach children? How would people from different parts of the world talk to each other then? How would we use the tools we have in an ecological and creative way for the benefit of the entire planet and the people who live on it?

Let your dream lead you into the future. What would medicine be like? Will people turn to doctors, as we do now? Will there be more hospitals? If you could change the world through a simple dream, through visualization, how would you transform hospitals, schools and companies? What will the office of the future look like? Will there be offices at all? Or will everyone be connected to others right at home? How will people travel in the future? There is no need to limit yourself to today's technology. Imagine that you live on a planet where everything you can imagine automatically becomes reality. The only limit will be the limits of your imagination.

How will we treat animals and plants in the future? Will we need lawyers and psychotherapists? What will be the most important job in the future?

What kind of music will they listen to in the future? What will be the museums? If you were to go to a museum displaying today's objects, which one would be the most fun for people of the future?

What could you think of that would change the world the most? What parts of our lives have more room for change?

Imagine that you can change the world through something that you have made yourself. Dream about what you could do and how it could change the world.

Let your unconscious continue to develop this dream in such a way that it becomes the most suitable for you and that this process brings you an inner sense of pleasure, joy and hope.

Then, for a moment, let your mind move from the future to the past. Think about your life and find the moment when the dream became a reality for you. Remember something that was just a dream for you before, and later you found it to be a reality.

Perhaps each of you has dreams that have come true. And, perhaps, if you find one such dream, you will begin to understand: “Yes, there is another one!” Maybe there are even dreams that you have forgotten that they were once dreams, because today they are normal reality, just another lousy day in paradise.

As you look at the world around you, notice that many of the things you see around you are actually dreams come true; the room in which you sit, the electric light in which you read, the chair in which you rest, the book you hold in your hand. All these things were once dreams, but now they have become a reality.

We live in a world of dreams that come true. Perhaps you yourself have helped others make their dreams come true. Maybe you yourself are someone's dream come true. Perhaps your parents dreamed about you even before you were born. You may have stepped into someone's life at the exact moment that someone like you needed to show up.

So take care of your dreams. Cherish dreams that have become reality. And, returning to the present at the speed that is most convenient for you, maybe you yourself will feel that you are in a wonderful position - on the threshold of a new dream. Behind you are dreams that have come true. Ahead - new dreams that give meaning to your whole life.

MEDITATION-VISUALIZATION

Below are some descriptions of visualization meditations. Let us give in detail the texts of immersion into a relaxation state and exit from it only in the first description. In other cases, they are similar.

The ship on which I sail

The following psychotechnics is partly diagnostic. The image of the vessel born by the participants (a heavy cruiser, a flying brigantine, a fragile boat or a slippery unstable raft), the voyage made on this vessel can be considered a metaphorical reflection of a person’s ideas about himself and his life path. These images can talk about the current physical and mental state, about a person’s perception of the conditions of his life and ways to overcome the difficulties and obstacles that arise (you must admit, there is a difference between seeing a yacht with a hole below the waterline in the midst of a fierce storm or a caravel rapidly sliding but the waves in the rays rising sun). However, you should not tell the participants about this interpretation of the visualizations, especially since it cannot be considered more than a probabilistic hypothesis.

- Sit comfortably, take a position that seems most comfortable to you. Close your eyes and do not open them until the end of the exercise and do not move.

Your body begins to gradually relax. You feel the tension in your muscles disappear. With each uttered word, every muscle of the body is more and more filled with a feeling of peace and pleasant lethargy. Your breathing is even and calm. Air freely fills the lungs and leaves them easily. The heart beats clearly, rhythmically. Turn your inner gaze to the fingers of your right hand. The tailbones of the fingers of the right hand seem to touch the surface of warm water. You feel the pulse in your fingertips. There is a feeling that the hand is gradually immersed in warm water. This magical water washes your right hand, relaxes it and rises up your arm... Up to your elbow... Even higher... Now your entire arm is immersed in pleasant warmth, relaxing... Fresh water runs through the veins and arteries of your right hand. renewed blood, giving it rest and nourishing it with new strength... Breathing is even, calm. The heart beats clearly, rhythmically ... And now your inner gaze turns to the fingers of your left hand.

The text above is completely repeated for the left hand. At the end, be sure to give an installation regarding breathing and the heart..

Turn your attention to your feet. The feet are relaxed. They feel a pleasant warmth, reminiscent of the warmth of a fire burning in a fireplace. It feels like your feet are on a fireplace grate. Kind, gentle warmth rises up the legs, giving life-giving relaxation and rest to the muscles... Tension disappears... And now the muscles of the legs relax - from the fingertips to the thigh... Breathing is even, calm. The heart beats clearly, rhythmically ...

There is another source of heat in your body. It is in the area of ​​the solar plexus. It is as if a small sun saturates your internal organs with its life-giving rays and gives them health, helps them function better... The muscles of the abdomen and chest straighten, relax... A pleasant, relaxing warmth spreads throughout the body, which creates a feeling of peace and relaxation... Tension disappears in the shoulders, in the cervical region, in the lower part of the back of the head ... You feel how the tension accumulated here dissolves and disappears ... Leaves ... If you lie down, then your back feels the good power of the earth through the surface on which you lie. .. This force allows you to relax and pours new, fresh energy into your relaxed body... Breathing is even, calm. The heart beats clearly, rhythmically ... Now your inner gaze turns to the face. Facial muscles relax... Tension is removed from the cheekbones... From the jaws... Lips become soft and supple... Wrinkles on the forehead are smoothed out... The eyelids stop trembling... They are simply closed and motionless... All the muscles of the face relaxed... A light, cool breeze washes your face... It is pleasant and kind - this air kiss... The air brings you its healing energy... Breathing is even, calm. The heart beats clearly, rhythmically ...

Your whole body enjoys complete peace... Tension subsides, dissolves, goes away... Fatigue disappears... You are filled with a sweet feeling of rest, relaxation, peace... Peace that fills you with new strength, fresh and pure energy...

You are relaxed and free. You can be where you want to be. Where you feel good. For someone, maybe this is his own house, for someone it is a corner of the yard where he liked to hide in childhood. And for some, it's just a clearing in a summer forest, where you can wallow in the grass and see a dazzling blueness above you ... Stay a little in this place. Soak up the positive energy of this place dear to you...

And now let's go further... You slowly walk along the road and now you hear the sound of the sea - the waves roll on the shore and run back again. And this sound cannot be confused with anything. Another turn, and in front of you in full breadth, half the world - the ever-moving surface of the sea. The sound of the surf is heard much more clearly here, you can feel the salty taste of spray on your lips and see the port full of ships. There are no ships here! Mixed times and countries in this magical port. There are huge modern ocean liners, and Indian shuttles, hollowed out of a tree trunk, and ancient Greek pirogues, and galleons of the Spanish conquistadors, and pirate schooners, and boats, and yachts, and fishing launches, and graceful brigantines, and punts, and catamarans. Up to the nuclear-powered ships, aircraft carriers and Captain Nemo's Nautilus ...

You walk along the piers and admire all this variety of shapes, colors, equipment. Know that any of these ships can be yours. Choose for yourself what suits you best, what you like, what meets your needs and ideas about the ship you need ... Look carefully at what you have chosen. Is it a huge frigate or an ordinary sailboat? Or maybe a light motorboat? What is the shape of this vessel? Streamlined, directed forward, designed for speed? Or is it a heavy-weight but durable structure that can withstand any storm? What color are the sides of your ship? Does it have an anchor? Or maybe you don't need it at all? Read the inscription on board the ship. What is its name? What are the letters of this name?

Board your ship. Who meets you there? Or is there no one on board? What does the greeter look like? Listen: he is telling you something... Examine the ship from the inside. If it's a big enough ship, go around it slowly. Look into the cabins and into the wheelhouse... Climb to the captain's bridge... Walk along the decks, go down into the hold... What did you see in all these parts of your ship? Go to the cabin you will be occupying. Or just designate a spot for yourself on your boat. Look - here lies a sheet of paper folded several times. Expand it. This is a map. It indicates the purpose of your first voyage. What is this goal? Is there a destination name?

Set sail on your own. Your ship is leaving the port... The coast is getting farther and farther away... The tops of the highest masts of the ships left in the port have already disappeared behind the horizon. You are at sea on your ship, you yourself have chosen your path in this boundless sea space ... You are moving towards your goal ... Is it far? What awaits you on the way? I don't know... Now you will see the continuation of your film about your own voyage. See...

The leader is silent. Let participants' imaginations run without prompting for one or two minutes..

But it's time to make a stop in our voyage. Guide your ship to the nearest harbor... Your journey ends for today. You go down the ladder. Before you leave, look back, look again at your ship, remember how you leave it today. You will probably return to it more than once to continue your voyage. Remember that it will always be waiting for you at the pier... You go farther and farther away from your ship... And again you are transported here, into this room, you begin to feel your body...

Now I'll start counting from seven to one. With each next number, you will begin to get out of the state of relaxation more and more - until the moment when I call the number "one" and you will get up rested, cheerful, full of new strength and energy.

So, seven... You feel the feeling come back to you. own body... Lethargy and apathy recede. You begin to return to your normal state. Six... Your muscles fill with strength and energy... You are still motionless, but after a few moments you will be able to easily get up and start moving... Five... A state of calmness remains, but it begins to be filled with a sense of strength and the ability to act ... Relaxation is replaced by composure ... Four. You feel that you have finally come to your senses and are ready to be active. Cheerfulness and energy fill you more and more. Three. Move your feet. You fully feel your legs and are able to easily tense your muscles. Wiggle your fingers. Slowly curl your fingers into a fist. Two. Without opening your eyes, turn your head. You are cheerful, filled with strength and energy. Did you have a good rest. You are calm and confident. One. They opened their eyes. We got up. Don't do it too fast.

When discussing the effects of exercise, in addition to reflecting on the state, it is good to get answers to such questions:

What vessel did you choose for your voyage? Describe it.

What color was it dyed?

What is it called?

Did anyone meet you on board the ship?

What did the greeter tell you?

What interesting things did you discover while inspecting the vessel?

What is the purpose of your voyage, fixed on the map?

Did you see the name of the destination?

What was the weather like when you left the port? What happened to you while swimming?

Participants' stories can be very interesting, full of unexpected details and vivid details. Almost certainly, the presenter will be bombarded with questions like: "What do the words of the captain of the ship mean? And why was my ship called that way? What is the meaning of the events that happened to me on the voyage?" It seems to us that it is better for the facilitator to refrain from evaluations and interpretations, advising the participants themselves to reflect on the symbolism of the images presented to them by the subconscious.

The sage from the temple

Psychotherapists often use in meditation techniques archetypal images of an ancient wise man, a temple, a candle flame, and the like (see, for example, J. Rainwater, (1992), as they allow a person to access the resources of his own subconscious. In the psychotechnics described below, all listed archetypes.

Imagine yourself standing in a clearing in a summer forest. Thick grass rises up to your knees, and flower petals touch your feet. Around the trees, their foliage rustles a warm breeze. The sun's rays create a bizarre mosaic of light and shadow. You hear the whistles of birds, the chirping of the forge

Have you ever dreamed about anything? A property of the psyche, which develops from childhood, is a tendency to imagination. What is this property in psychology? What are its types? A fantastic representation of something allows children to develop their imagination, which is associated with another important property - creativity.

Each creative person is someone who has a well-developed imagination. This is the ability to see the picture of the future before it is realized. This is the ability to present in all colors what needs to be done.

Developed imagination allows you to anticipate events, to predict. It can be said that people supernatural abilities They also have a highly developed imagination. Small children who draw, sculpt, and construct something also use their imagination. It allows you to make the world more perfect, more interesting, more beautiful, especially in those moments when reality is not very attractive.

What is imagination?

All people use their imagination. The degree of this process depends only on the level of its development. What is imagination? This is a mental, conscious activity of a person who presents visual-figurative pictures in his thoughts. In other words, this process is called daydreaming, fantasizing, visualization.

Imagination helps to present pictures that have not yet been realized, they are difficult to realize today, or there is no need for their execution. To some extent, a person through imagination is looking for a way out of the situation, even if it is just a visualization of his desire.

Psychologists have not yet fully studied the phenomenon of imagination, since it is invisible, imperceptible, it is impossible to measure or touch it. Imagination is understood as the ability of a person to recreate pictures of any direction, which are based on the existing experience that was obtained earlier.

Imagination becomes very important in professional activity or at the stage when a new solution to a problem that is unique or previously unknown needs to be found. This is where people show their creativity. Using imagination, a person can find new ways to solve the problem. Here, the breadth of view, flexibility and other qualities that allow you to look at the situation from many angles become important.

The imagination of a person, as well as his ability to, can serve as a powerful means of resisting the ups and downs of life. To "abstract" from an object means to mentally "push" it aside or "exclude" from one's consideration. Possessing imagination, a person can "transfer" himself beyond the current situation, "scroll" alternative options, and thereby create a psychological space of his own choice. In this way, you can feel your own being more fully and remain free.

Existential psychologists emphasize the importance of the concept of freedom in the lives of each of their patients. They do not believe in the existence of some higher principle that controls everything in the universe and determines the fate of people. However, for many, freedom is burdensome, because it implies the recognition of personal responsibility for their actions.

Deep down, people recognize the fact of their loneliness and therefore try to resist it by uniting with other people. However, if a person is largely dependent on others, he mistakenly thinks that his own existence is impossible in isolation from them.

In the course of psychotherapy, after the patient realizes his true aspirations, the therapist helps him to eliminate the factors that prevent the realization of his desires. The therapist reminds the patient that everyone makes decisions every day, even when they don't think about it. When people resort to the help of their defense mechanisms, shielding themselves from the flow of existential truth, they often find themselves in unpleasant situations:

• They involuntarily classify themselves as special or omnipotent people. Irvin Yalom emphasizes that such an individual can become selfish and paranoid.
• Thoughtlessly believe in the "savior". Too much attachment to this idea can make a person addicted. For existential therapists, this is a kind of taboo, since the idea of ​​salvation from the outside contradicts obvious existential facts.

Imagination in psychology

How do psychologists characterize the concept of imagination? In psychology, it has a broad concept that includes the ability to recreate previously perceived images, manipulate them without having direct physical contact, predict and imagine a future that has not yet materialized. A person in his imagination can be anyone and live as he pleases. Sometimes imagination is confused with perception, but these are different mental processes.

Imagination is based on images from memory, and not on what is happening in the outside world. Often a person imagines such images that are far from reality, they are called dreams or fantasies.

All people are imaginative. Another thing is that everyone uses this property in different ways. There are pragmatic, boring, skeptical people who simply do not want, do not know how to use their imagination, or they have it undeveloped. The life of such people is subject to rules, logic, principles, facts. On the one hand, their life flows measuredly, understandably and without incident. On the other hand, such people become boring, monotonous, uninteresting. After all, imagination makes people individual, unique, special.

Imagination Functions:

• Cognitive - helps to gain new knowledge, see new options, compose existing information and get new facts.
• Forecasting - helps a person to foresee the further development of events even when actions are not performed or not completed.
• Understanding - allows you to imagine the feelings and state of another person. This is called empathy.
• Protective - anticipating possible difficulties and troubles, a person can protect himself from them.
• Self-development - imagining, a person improves, becomes different.
• Memories - allows a person to recreate pictures from the past in his head, relive them and scroll through them.

Usually a person uses mainly one function of the imagination, but combinations are also possible. How are images and representations created in the imagination?

1. Agglutination is the transformation of an existing object into a completely new phenomenon. It becomes improved, new, perfect.
2. Emphasizing - focusing on the dominant characteristic of a particular object, person, phenomenon, highlighting it against the general background.
3. Typing - highlighting general characteristics from several objects, combining them into something new that contains a part of each object.

In almost all areas of life, a person uses imagination. New gadgets, medicines, clothing models are being created that contain everything that has already been positively noted in previous models.

Imagination is based on the existing experience, which is now being transformed, improved. All this happens so far only in the head. It is not reality, although it may become one. Often people simply imagine something that can never be or there is no such technology that could realize the imagined fantasy.

A person imagines only what he is interested in. This helps to know a little about yourself, your tastes and wishes. At the same time, imagination allows a person to draw up a plan of action, imagining the result that one wants to achieve. Thus, the image, imagination is a way of drawing up a plan according to which a person is going to live in the near future.

Types of imagination

You should consider the types of imagination on the website of the psychotherapeutic help website:

• Active (arbitrary). It is an active and purposeful presentation by a person of what he wants to see. Often this occurs when it is necessary to solve some problem, to play a certain role. A person controls what he sees, consciously controlling the process.

• Passive (involuntary). The easiest way, in which a person is practically not included in the process of creating new images. They are created on the basis of existing images that are combined. At the same time, a person practically does not control the imagination, the consciousness is weak, there is no intention to embody ideas. Often such dreams arise in a drowsy or half-asleep state.

• Creative. This type of imagination is a reflection of reality with a certain amount of novelty, uniqueness. You can use existing data, or you can introduce something new, combine with existing data and get something unique.

• Recreative. This type of imagination is aimed at presenting something that a person has never seen, but has certain descriptions of this object. For example, mentally fly into space or move to prehistoric times.

• Dream. This type of imagination is active, in which a person imagines what he wants. Dreams reflect desires that I would like to realize in the future. Here you can plan your further actions, as well as predict the development of events.

Dreams can be helpful or harmful. If they are divorced from reality, have nothing to do with a person's capabilities, make him passive and relaxed, then dreams turn into dreams in which an individual can plunge for a long time. If dreams are close to reality, have a clear structure, an implementation plan and mobilize a person, then we are talking about the useful side of this process.

There is nothing wrong with dreams, fantasies and visions of your future. Sometimes it's even good to relax and move for a while to where you are happy, loved, rich, successful, healthy, or doing what you want to do. But sometimes a person is so carried away by his dreams that he forgets about reality. Often, the harshness of life pushes you to run into your own fantasies and often sleep, dream, which can also be fantastic, pleasant and magical.

Psychologists have noticed that the more unrealistic a person's fantasies are, the lower his self-esteem. Moreover, the more fantastic the dreams are, the more unsightly the reality is. Not only does a person, for some reason, have low self-esteem, but he also does not want to change his reality so that it is not gray, boring or cruel.

Dreaming with the goal of imagining what you are striving for is one thing. But it's a completely different approach when you dream, because this is the only state that gives you joy. This is already more like an escape than a search for stimuli and energy, which are acquired in the first case. Here it is better to understand why you do not want to change your reality, make it more pleasant and colorful, rather than wasting time and energy on empty dreams. After all, what you fantasize will not change anything. As long as you just dream about something, it remains a dream. But this ability is not given to a person so that he wastes his time on empty thoughts and pictures. Fantasies are given in order to draw energy from them to achieve goals and once again check your actions, which should contribute to the realization of what you want.

Of course, no one will forbid you to dream and make your fantasies unrealistic. But you still have to live in reality. In that case, why not make it as beautiful as your dreams?

Imagination and creativity

Psychologists insist that imagination and creativity are interconnected. Creativity is the creation of something new based on what is in reality. Imagination allows you to imagine this new even before it is created. For the most part, the imagination acts as a search for a new solution, an object, a plan of action, by implementing which it will be able to achieve the task.

Creative imagination involves the creation of a unique object that did not exist before. This is to some extent due to the individual characteristics of the person himself. Most creative imagination is an innate quality. However, methods are being developed to develop creative thinking.

1. At the first stage, a fuzzy idea appears, an image that does not yet have clearly defined boundaries and forms.
2. The second stage is to nurture the idea, think it over, see it more clearly, and improve it.
3. The third stage is the transition from nurturing an idea to its implementation.

Children's imagination is fantastic, devoid of reality and rationalism. Already in adolescence, the human mind becomes critical, which becomes very noticeable by an older age. This to some extent complicates the process of creativity, when a person must be flexible, versatile, uncritical.

The development of creative thinking requires human curiosity. Reading books, watching shows, traveling and much more allow you to see something new for yourself and become embraced by new experiences. Often, involuntary imagination is included here, which can soon become controlled by a person.

A world in which only you live seems unthinkable and incredible, because people exist in a world where there are others. You can go to the forest or wild trails where people usually do not go. But to completely stay in a world where there will be no one is something from fiction and fantasy.

There are a large number of people on planet Earth, but many live in a world in which only They exist. These are the so-called creative individuals who do not connect with the surrounding society. By their temperament, they are so immersed in their own world that everyday problems are alien to them.

A creative person lives in a world where only He exists. This is not a whim, not a whim, not an escape from reality, but such is nature. Without the realization of the inner potential, a creative person will not be able to enter the outside world. Undoubtedly, even he eats, communicates with other people, worries about social position in the country, creates a family, etc. But the rules and traditions by which society lives become so insignificant to him that in the eyes of others he seems detached from reality.

A creative person does not renounce reality. Moreover, he deeply sees her. Just vanity and ridiculous traditions invented by people seem to him unnecessary and stupid. He just doesn't follow them.

The world in which there is only Me is the psychology of a creative person. Undoubtedly, he lives in a world where other people exist. But until his inner potential is revealed and realized, a creative person will be focused on only one thing - to immerse himself in any situation and be ready at any moment to manifest himself as a creative person.

Development of imagination in children

Imagination in children is the most developed, active and uncontrollable. We can say that children involuntarily imagine what they see or want to see. This kind of thinking helps to understand the world, systematize knowledge, understand the essence of what is happening. The development of imagination in children occurs in stages:

• Up to 4-5 years old, the child operates with images that he can form and improve himself.
• After 4-5 years, the child begins to manage his own images, plan them, look for ways out of the situation.
• At 6-7 years old, children easily imagine themselves and their own lives.

It should be noted that the imagination of each child develops differently. This is influenced not only by individual characteristics of mental development, but also by external factors:

1. environment in which the child lives.
2. Emotions that the child constantly experiences.
3. Opportunity to express yourself as a creative person.
4. Speech and age of the child. With the advent of speech, the child receives more possibilities for your creative development.

Children actively use their imagination at an early age. They draw, sing, dance, sculpt, etc. These activities should not be hindered. It is also recommended to write stories together with the child, as well as play role-playing games, where the child will play various professions, for example.

Growing up, the child acquires experience, interests, hobbies, in which he shows his creative thinking. In this case, parents should also not create obstacles if they want their child to have a developed imagination.

Outcome

Imagination plays an important role in human life. In order to imagine something, predict or remember, you need imagination. Undoubtedly, it will be filled with various fantastic ideas about life that a person still believes in, regardless of his age. However, the result of a developed imagination is the ability not only to dream, but also to plan your own future.

You can not use imagination, but apply only logical facts and principles. This will make a person's life monotonous and consistent. On the other hand, the lack of a creative approach makes a person boring, uninteresting, monotonous. He becomes like other people, loses his "zest", individuality.

Imagination is present in all people. It's just that not everyone uses it. Everyone is free to decide how to use their own opportunities. The most important thing is that all tools enrich a person's life, and not limit him.

Our fantasies and dreams are able to paint life with new colors. Without them it is difficult to imagine our daily existence. The images that arise in the head, a kaleidoscope of pictures and dreams not only give a mood, but also develop creative abilities and extraordinary thinking.

Imagination in psychology

The human brain is able not only to perceive and remember information, but also to perform all kinds of operations with it. In ancient times, primitive people were at first completely similar to animals: they got food and built primitive dwellings. But human abilities have evolved. And one fine day, people realized that it is much more difficult to hunt an animal with bare hands than with the help of special devices. Scratching their heads, the savages sat down and invented a spear, a bow and arrows, an axe. All these objects, before they were created, were embodied in the form of images in the human brain. This process is called imagination.

People developed, and at the same time the ability to mentally create images, completely new and on the basis of existing ones, improved. Not only thoughts, but also desires and aspirations were formed on this foundation. Based on this, it can be argued that imagination in psychology is one of the processes of cognition of the surrounding reality. This is an imprint of the outside world in the subconscious. It allows not only to imagine the future, to program it, but also to remember the past.

In addition, the definition of imagination in psychology can be formulated in another way. For example, it is often called the ability to mentally represent an absent object or phenomenon, manipulate it in one's mind, and retain its image. Often imagination is confused with perception. But psychologists argue that these cognitive functions of the brain are fundamentally different. Unlike perception, imagination creates images based on memory, and not on the outside world, and it is also less real, as it often contains elements of dreams and fantasy.

Imagination functions

It is difficult to imagine a person who has no imagination at all. If you think about it, then in your environment there are people who are pragmatic, as if down to earth. All their actions are dictated by logic, principles and arguments. But to say that they have absolutely no creative thinking and imagination is impossible. It's just that these cognitive processes are either underdeveloped or are in a "dormant" state.

It's a bit of a pity for such people: they live boring and uninteresting, they do not use the creative possibilities of the brain. After all, according to general psychology, imagination gives us the opportunity to be individual, unlike the "gray mass". With its help, a person stands out, occupies his niche in society. Imagination has several functions, using which, each of us becomes a special person:

• Cognitive. With the help of imagination, we expand our horizons, gain knowledge, acting in an uncertain situation based on our conjectures and ideas.
• Prediction function. The properties of the imagination in psychology are such that they help us to imagine the result of an unfinished activity. This function also shapes our dreams and daydreams.
• Understanding. With the help of imagination, we can imagine what the interlocutor has in his soul, what feelings he experiences. We understand his problem and behavior, conditionally putting ourselves in his place.
• Protection. By predicting possible future events, we can thereby protect ourselves from trouble.
• Self-development. The properties of imagination in psychology allow us to create, invent, fantasize with its help.
• Memory. We remember the past, which is stored in our brain in the form of certain images and ideas.

All of the above functions of the imagination are developed differently. Each person is dominated by a separate property, which often affects his behavior and character.

The main ways of creating images

There are several of them, but each of them characterizes the concept of imagination in psychology as a rather complex, multi-level process.

1. Agglutination. Evaluating and analyzing the qualities, properties and appearance of an object, we create in our imagination a new, sometimes bizarre image, far from reality. For example, in this way the fairy-tale character Centaur (a human body and horse legs), as well as Baba Yaga's hut (a house and chicken legs), an elf (a human image and insect wings) were invented in this way. As a rule, a similar technique is used when creating myths and legends.
2. Accent. Isolation in a person, object or activity of a single dominant characteristic and its hyperbolization. This method is actively used by artists during the creation of caricatures and cartoons.
3. Typing. The most complex method, based on highlighting the features of several objects and creating a new, composite image from them. So come up literary heroes, characters of fairy tales.

These are the basic techniques of imagination in psychology. Their result is already existing material, but transformed and modified. Even scientists in their seemingly boring and dry field of activity also actively use imagination. After all, they developed new types of medicines, inventions and various know-hows at the expense of existing knowledge and skills. Having learned from them something special and most importantly, they create a completely new product. Thus, we can conclude: without imagination, humanity would never know what progress is in all activities.

active imagination

Usually there are such types of imagination in psychology: active and passive. They differ not only in their internal content, but also in the main forms of their manifestation. Active imagination is the conscious construction of various images in your mind, solving problems and recreating connections between subjects. One of the ways it manifests itself is fantasy. For example, an author writes a script for a film. He invents a story based on real facts, embellished with fictional details. The flight of thought can lead so far that in the end what is written turns out to be phantasmagoric and virtually impossible.

An example of fantasy is any action movie in cinema: elements of real life are present here (weapons, drugs, criminal authorities) along with exaggerated characteristics of the characters (their invincibility, the ability to survive under the onslaught of hundreds of attacking hooligans). Fantasy manifests itself not only during creativity, but also in everyday life. We often mentally reproduce human capabilities that are unrealistic, but so desirable: the ability to become invisible, fly, breathe underwater. Imagination and fantasy in psychology are closely interconnected. Often they result in productive creativity or ordinary dreams.

A special manifestation of active imagination is a dream - the mental creation of images of the future. So, we often imagine what our house by the sea will look like, what car we will buy with the accumulated money, what we will name the children and what they will become when they grow up. It differs from fantasy in its reality, earthiness. A dream can always come true, the main thing is to apply all your efforts and skills to this.

passive imagination

These are images that visit our consciousness involuntarily. We do not put any effort into this: they arise spontaneously, have both real and fantastic content. The most striking example of passive imagination is our dreams - an imprint of what was previously seen or heard, our fears and desires, feelings and aspirations. During "movie nights" we can see possible options the development of certain events (a quarrel with loved ones, a disaster, the birth of a child) or absolutely fantastic scenes (an incomprehensible kaleidoscope of unrelated images and actions).

By the way, the last type of visions, provided that a waking person sees it, is called a hallucination. This is also passive imagination. In psychology, there are several reasons for this condition: severe head trauma, alcohol or drug intoxication, intoxication. Hallucinations have nothing to do with real life, they are often completely fantastic, even insane visions.

In addition to active and passive, one can also distinguish the following types of imagination in psychology:

• Productive. Creation of completely new ideas and images as a result of creative activity.
• Reproductive. Recreating pictures according to existing schemes, graphs and illustrative examples.

Each of these types of imagination is capable of influencing real events, activities and even the future of the individual.

The role of imagination in human life

If it seems to you that you can live without it, then you are greatly mistaken. Imagination has its embodiment in practice in the form of a certain activity, and this is not always creativity. For example, with its help we solve mathematical and other logical problems. By imagining the condition mentally, we find the correct answer. Imagination also helps to control and regulate emotions and relieve tension in relationships between people. Imagine the following situation: the husband says that he is going to the bathhouse with his friends, but promises to compensate for his absence with a romantic trip to a restaurant. Angry and resentful at first, the wife, anticipating beautiful candles, foaming champagne and delicious seafood, suppresses her anger and avoids a quarrel.

Imagination in psychology is closely connected with thinking, therefore it has a direct impact on the knowledge of the world. Thanks to him, we can mentally perform actions, manipulate the images of objects, simulate situations, thereby developing analytical mental activity. Imagination even helps to regulate the physical state of the body. There are known facts when only by the power of thought a person changed blood pressure, body temperature or pulse rate. It is these possibilities of imagination that are the foundation of auto-training. And vice versa: by inventing the presence of various diseases, a person really begins to feel the symptoms of ailments.

The ideomotor act is also a practical embodiment of the imagination. It is often used by illusionists when they are trying to find objects hidden in the hall. Its essence is that by imagining movement, the magician provokes it. The artist notices microchanges in the look or grip of the audience's hands and unmistakably determines who has the thing he needs.

Development of the imagination

Mental activity is inseparable from images. Therefore, thinking and imagination in psychology are closely related. The development of logic and analytical skills helps us to improve our fantasies, creativity and latent abilities. The main types of development of imagination with the help of thinking are:

1. Game activity. Especially the modeling of life situations, role-playing scenes, the creation of a number of associations, as well as modeling, origami and drawing.
2. Reading literature, as well as an independent attempt at writing: writing poems, stories, essays. It is also effective to describe what you read verbally and with the help of images.
3. The study geographical maps. During this lesson, we always imagine the landscapes of a particular country, the appearance of people, their activities.
4. Drawing graphs, diagrams, charts.

As we can see, imagination and thinking, imagination and creativity, psychology studies are inseparable from each other. Only their common functionality and complementarity make us truly unique individuals.

We have already seen that psychology considers the development of the imagination in parallel with the progress of thinking. His close connection with the activity is also proven, as evidenced by one story that happened to a certain violinist. For a petty crime, he was imprisoned for several years. Of course, he was not given an instrument, so every night he played an imaginary violin. When the musician was released, it turned out that not only did he not forget the notes and works, but now he mastered the instrument much better than ever.

Inspired by this story, doctors from Harvard Medical School decided to conduct a unique study. They divided the subjects into two groups: one played a real piano, the other a fictitious one. As a result, those who imagined the instrument only in their thoughts showed good results. They not only mastered the basic musical compositions, but also demonstrated good physical shape. It turned out that their fingers were trained as if they were practicing on a real piano.

As you can see, imagination is not only fantasies, daydreams, dreams and the game of the subconscious, it is also what helps people to work and create in real life. Psychologists say that it can be controlled and thus become more educated and developed. But sometimes you have to be afraid. After all, the false facts that the imagination palms off on us can push us to commit a crime. One has only to remember Othello to understand what trouble our flight of fancy can cause.

Healing with Imagination

Psychologists say that the best way to become healthy is to imagine yourself as such. blooming and full of energy the image in our mind quickly becomes a real fact, and the disease recedes. This effect is described in detail by both medicine and psychology. The topic "Imagination and its impact on oncology" was studied in detail by Dr. Cal Simonton, a leading specialist in cancer diseases. He claimed that meditation and auto-training helped even those patients who were diagnosed with the last stage of the disease to recover.

For a group of people diagnosed with throat cancer, the doctor suggested, in parallel with drug treatment use a course of so-called relaxation therapy. Three times a day, the patients relaxed and presented a picture of their complete healing. Patients who could no longer swallow on their own imagined how they had a delicious dinner with their family, how food freely and painlessly penetrated through the larynx straight into the stomach.

The result amazed everyone: after a year and a half, some patients did not even have traces of the disease. Dr. Simonton is sure that positive images in our brain, will and desire can work wonders. Imagination is always ready to be embodied in a real form. Therefore, where there is war, it is worth imagining peace, where quarrels are harmony, where illness is health. A person has many hidden abilities, but only imagination gives us the opportunity to rise above all limitations, overcoming space and time.

The level of imagination in different people

To determine it, you need to contact a specialist. He will prompt you to take an imagination test. Psychology, its methods in the form of questions and answers are able to analyze the level and possibilities of this mental state specifically in you. It has already been proven that women have better imagination than men. The representatives of the stronger sex are naturally more activated in the left hemisphere of the brain, which is responsible for logic, analysis, and language abilities. Therefore, imagination often plays a small role in their lives: men like to operate with specific facts and arguments. And women are influenced by the right hemisphere of the brain, which makes them more sensitive, intuitive. Imagination and fantasies often become their prerogative.

As for children, their fantasies and dreams often amaze adults. Toddlers are able to go far from reality, hide in a fictional world. But this does not mean that their imagination is more developed: because of the small life experience their brains do not have in their stock such a gallery of images as adults have. But, even with insufficient experience, children are sometimes able to amaze with the revelry of their imagination.

Astrologers have another interesting version. They argue that everything unconscious, including the imagination, is controlled by the Moon. The sun, on the contrary, is responsible for specific actions and actions of a person. Since Cancers, Scorpios, Pisces, Aquarius and Sagittarius are under the great influence of the Moon, their imagination is richer and more multifaceted than that of other signs of the Zodiac. Be that as it may, you can always develop your fantasies and creative inclinations. The processes of imagination, indicated in psychology, can be easily improved. Thanks to them, you become a separate person, unlike the "gray mass" of people and clearly stand out from the crowd of the same face.

Human imagination. In itself, this phrase is wrong. because only man has imagination and animal imagination does not exist. Let's look into this amazing, truly human ability to imagine.

Some people are said to have a good imagination, some people have a rich imagination. They can come up with dozens of entertaining stories, tell something that others have not heard, and even in such a way that others cannot reproduce it like that. Is there a person without imagination?

If we are talking about a healthy person, then in fact, all people have imagination. It belongs to higher cognitive processes in our psyche. Yes, there are tragic cases when people lose many cognitive abilities as a result of injury or disease. But we are talking about healthy people.

The concept of imagination

What does "cognitive" mean? In this context, this means that the imagination helps a person to learn about the world around him and use this knowledge as he sees fit. Based on the information received, a person can create new images. It is impossible to come up with something new if you do not know the old.

Therefore, any brilliant discoveries that scientists have made are the result of fruitful work, and not talent. Every person is talented. It's just that his level of experience does not allow him to fully imagine. This is quite difficult for him.

How does imagination arise? It is a consequence of the needs that a person has in life. Everyone wants to change something, but from the very beginning you need to present the finished result, and then go to it. Any object the inventor first appeared in fantasy, and then brought to life. Imagination is a great tool for visualize goals.

Imagination was developed in man through labor. famous genius in the environment of physics A. Einstein said that imagination is better than knowledge, since it can create something that can significantly affect the processes taking place in the world. Many imaginations arise in a person's head every day. Their number in most cases goes over a thousand.

Some of them leave no trace. They are not remembered as those that mean little. But the most interesting ones can settle in a person’s head for a long time. They are the ones who form content of the imagination. The emergence of the iPhone in Steve Jobs' head was preceded by a series of other imaginations that the genius of the mobile industry did not even remember. But since the idea of ​​the iPhone was beyond praise, it was even brought to life.

So, imagination is a process that consists in creating new images, this happens due to the processing of the material of perception and experience (memory).

The value of imagination in human life

Imagination in human life is very important. Imagination allows a person to fully live:

• communicate with other people
• visualize goals
• apply your natural creativity
• make discoveries
• come up with something new
• find solutions to complex problems
• to know what is still unknown
• imagine and understand what a person has never seen in reality (for example, how electrons move around an atom)
• calculate your actions a few steps ahead (in business, career, relationships)
• predict events and solutions

And much more. In our age, human intellectual activity is quite strongly connected with the imagination, especially in those professions in which computers cannot be entrusted with everything: programming, design, research. This is the reason why each of us needs to develop imagination.

The Importance of Imagination for Child Development

If we are talking about children, then human development and imagination are closely intertwined. In the first years and throughout preschool childhood, the child actively develops this cognitive process. And it turns out that if a child, for some reason, cannot develop his imagination enough, he may not develop many other necessary abilities.

Developed imagination allows in the future to form creativity, creative thinking, the ability to find original solutions, find a way out of difficult situations. Agree, all these skills are so necessary in the modern world that the development of the imagination is worth doing. In my opinion it is.

Imagination and human activity

If we look at human activity, we will see that any successful activity, any product, invention, object, work was done by people with a good imagination.

• any new invention is first imagined by a person, and only then is brought to life
• a quality item (be it a pen, a table, a scarf, a car) first appears in the mind of the developers
• writers, artists, sculptors, screenwriters, musicians, directors first come up with everything in their imagination
• Entrepreneurs visualize the possible outcomes of the transaction, the risks and rewards
• athletes (both amateurs and professionals) calculate many moves ahead in order to understand how to conduct their race, match, attempt
• each of us always imagines before doing some conscious act, without imagination there is no responsibility, no understanding of what each of our actions can lead to

As you can see, imagination in human activity is present in most life and professional situations. The better it is developed, the more chances we have to make our actions of the highest quality and favorable for us.

Imagination functions

1. Cognitive. By imagining what is not available to the human eye, we can mentally study the most complex elements of the surrounding world: atoms, distant space objects.

2. Planning function. By setting ourselves goals and plans, we imagine the final desired result. Works here too anticipation- anticipation of performance results.

3. Presentation function. We can imagine characters in stories, books, movies, friends, acquaintances.

4. Protective / therapeutic. When events have not happened, we can prepare for them and reenact the good and bad moments with the help of our imagination. Or, when the event has already happened, thanks to the imagination, we live it again in a lighter form, thereby calming (or, conversely, strengthening) emotions and sensations.

5. Transformative. Changing reality, creating new objects, processes, relationships.

Forms of imagination

1.passive. Arises by itself, without our will.

• dreams- passive involuntary imagination operates.
• dreams- daytime protective fantasies, passive voluntary imagination operate.
• hallucinations- act under the influence of the disease, or under the influence of any psychotropic substances (narcotic drugs or alcohol).

2. Active. We make an effort for the imagination.

• Recreating imagination. This imagination of what in reality a person has met or seen, perhaps partly contains a new one.
• creative imagination. This is the imagination of a completely new, previously non-existent person in the experience.

Imagination is one of the fundamental mental processes that determine our overall intellectual development. Therefore, the development of the imagination is one of the most important contributions to one's intelligence.

The easiest ways to develop imagination are:

• The accumulation of various vivid images from real life: observing nature, animals, viewing works of art (painting, sculpture), listening to the sounds of nature, classical music.
• Try to imagine in bright colors a person whom you know, but who is not currently near you. Remember and imagine what he is like, how he smiles, what color his eyes are, the structure of his hair, the tilt of his head when talking.

on public resources, including blogs, due to amateurism under the guise of criticism. This also applies to text fragments.. Only links and your words.

Hello! I am the first person in the world to cure true aphantasy.

There is no information about other cases, at least on the Internet, or imagination in a weak form was initially present, the authors of those statements did not delve into the term “aphantasy”.

My project is dedicated to imagination and working with it There is no passion, the best source of knowledge about imagination in the history of mankind.

After the aphantasy treatment, I developed my imagination to about 2.7 on the level scale. What are these levels? I have developed a system descriptions your his level of imagination, which allows you to very quickly determine or describe your situation with the so-called external imagination (hallucination). Here is the list of levels:

0. Afantasy. Inability to see anything. After closing the eyes - instant emptiness and a black screen. After awakening, there are no images and hallucinations. Even in a state of extreme fear, nothing appears. There are no "it seemed".

1. Rudimentary imagination. The ability to see certain images after closing the eyes for some meager time or the ability to imagine blurry figures, a sheet of paper is fuzzy. Develops quickly from training. There is almost no color as such. volume is possible. It is often possible to represent a single object in detail. It happens that something is imagining or “it seemed”.

2. Controlled imagination. The ability to hold images or blurry figures in space for a few seconds. There is no normal color. Theoretically, it is possible to see the whole world, but there is no quality.

3. Good imagination. Seeing color, not necessarily exact. A stable picture of the world after closing the eyes and the ability to work with it. The ability to watch movies from memory or create moving pictures without much difference from reality in quality, only in accuracy and size of the “screen” of the imaginary.

4. Realistic imagination. The ability to visit an imaginary world visible around the body, or to see something with open eyes, on top of the real world, in the manner of a sprite in games. It is often possible to apply an image to a real-life object, such as a drawing on a wall, with the power of the mind.

5. Embodying imagination. You can transform reality however you like. Remove objects, repaint grass and trees, make walls near buildings transparent, replace people with elves or devils, hang UFOs in the sky. The imaginary world completely covers the field of view and is realistically heard. It does not develop on its own without training from anyone. As a rule, they train in childhood. Such people complain only about problems with lighting and shadows in the real world from the added objects. Imaginary friends are a common childhood companion. This is the maximum level you need..

6. Uncontrolled superimagination. At this level, a person ceases to control what is happening. The imaginary comes to life and seizes control when it sees fit. Any stress and fear, not to mention substances, can lead to dangerous hallucinations. Such people can hardly be called completely mentally healthy. Their lives are a struggle to keep their sanity.

7. True hallucinations. It is believed that without substances can only occur in a schizophrenic who has already lost his mind and, moreover, is initially problematic. There is no way to distinguish hallucinations from reality, even by touching them with your hands. Snakes falling from the ceiling and a non-existent fire are popular occurrences in the lives of such people. They are not found outside the psychiatric hospitals, they are too dangerous for others and themselves.

You you can to be between two levels, these are only approximate milestones on the way.

Levels of Visual Imagination
Table of contents
About superguide

II. Unified Theory of Imagination

2. Types of imagination
3. Imagination in different people
4. Is a dream an imagination?
5. Imagination in tulpaforce

IV. How to cure aphantasy
1. Theory
2. Workouts

V. Black World
1. Let's get started
2. Light
3. Focus closed eyes
4. About the accessibility distance
5. Fixation
6. Darkness
7. Looking in general
VI. Perception
VII. How to work more efficiently
VIII. What to read
1. General literature

IX. Blog and radio

O super guide

I have been developing imagination for myself, mostly in the context of tulpaforcing (the technique of making imaginary friends as adults). If you come across words like “tulpa”, “force”, etc. in the text, but they don’t mean anything to you, just skip it.

My goal is to bring together in one material all the information necessary for the development of the imagination. You may have to skip a lot, for example, if you want to develop your level 1 to level 2, you will have to skip the section on curing aphantasy, but you can also read for general education on this topic. I tried to write the text in an interesting way, so as not to turn everything into another textbook.

Before you, in fact, a treatise or a small book from the world's best researcher of the imagination. Yes, I have looked all over the Internet and I can make such a positive statement: there is no person who knows the theory of imagination better than me. We can only compare Théodule Ribot, a researcher of the imagination, who lived more than a hundred years ago, but I nevertheless moved further than him, and modern psychoanalysts who deal with the aspect of perception, but you will also find everything useful that they can say in this text.

I didn’t want to strain and bother so much, but somewhere I was asked to answer a question, somewhere I wrote a post for fun, piece by piece a huge material was formed, and now I am actively studying English language and to raise your Upper Intermediate to Advanced level, I need a lot of difficult practice. So I decided to prepare this text for translation into English, at the same time correcting the problems that became apparent over time, and putting the information from the mass of posts in the correct order.

I will not compile a glossary, because I am insanely lazy. During the course of writing the blog (from which the Superguide originated) I had to come up with a bunch of terms, but I tried to make them not coincide with the already established ones and sound self-evident enough to be less confusing, plus I often used structured lists like a list of all kinds of imagination, so you can and get by, I hope.

And remember that I am not a teacher or a preacher. I'll post, because I like this kind of socialization. I'm not interested in proving something to anyone, preaching, bringing the light of truth, let people live in darkness further - what do I care? I developed the imagination for myself, I do not care about the good, kind and eternal, and this work is free and I will not receive a penny for it. That's why criticism and any other negative will not be accepted. Do you disagree with something? Would you like to fix something? Do you think that I could do something better? I do not care.

But if you want to praise or thank - I will only be glad.

I. All kinds of imagination (and more)

Do you need fast navigation through the world of imagination? Confused about types and varieties? Hoping for the best, but doubting the visible?

Otherwise, this post can be called " all kinds of graphics that you can theoretically see”.

There are a lot of options for what you see or can see, and everyone means something different by imagination. Because of the confusion, it's time summarize as a list where you will find your abilities with links to what it is and how to develop it.

It just covers absolutely all kinds of representation, imagination and so on.

1. Real world

Uncontrolled external imagination, about which below. It is located from the standpoint of science inside the head, formed by the brain. . From the positions of esotericism, approximately the same situation is a reality formed by the mind.

2. External imagination (hallucination)

Real world editing. Representation in the external imagination - hallucination, as it is called in English. texts are the same real world, which is simply not coordinated with other people, and, usually, with some sensors, at least it will not work to feel the presented as real. When presented, the eyes move, the picture does not feel different from the real one. Nothing. Generally. Unless at a low level of imagination, it will be blurry, poorly textured, and poorly lit ...

Weak outer imagination- glitches, "seemed", "imagined" and so on.

Strong outer imagination- the ability to edit the real world, as you like. Generally. The difference is that other people do not see this edit, it is personal.

3. Afterimage - a picture after closing the eyes

Similar to a computer freeze. If frames have not been rendered for some time, the last rendered frame freezes on the screen. You might get the impression that this is something else. But people without imagination cannot edit this frame.

People with a developed imagination can take it to one of the views and edit it there, why not. For the development of one of the types of imagination in itself is not suitable. .

Patients with aphantasy are absent as a class.

4. Sleep and Lucid Dreaming

OS is managed dreams. Sometimes they are divided into lucid - conscious, but almost uncontrollable - and completely controlled, but the nature of the phenomenon is the same. In the "Unified Theory of the Imagination" below, I have devoted a separate part to this (4). There are three schools of OS - at the entrance to sleep, during sleep and immediately after the end. At the entrance - Castaneda, a book about dreams. In time - Dobrochan's training manual, Laberge and, in general, the bulk. At the end - Rainbow, his lectures are on YouTube.

I don't know of a single case where someone would force a tulpa in their sleep. And many times they tried.

5. Sleepy performance

Superficial lucid dreaming can be said to be the control of dream graphics in a state of very light sleep. No other benefits. But it is easy to call, unlike the OS, and you can keep within half an hour, or even faster. But it's still a dream, not a fantasy. AT superguide the technique is not included as it is not even indirectly related to imagination, why - see the Unified Theory of Imagination section below.

6. Post-sleep vision

Synthetic technique invented by me. It is a sleepy representation, the remnants of a dream, inscribed in a weak external imagination, as if stretched over a skeleton. Needed for specific purposes in the treatment of aphantasia. The technique is presented in the section Superguide for the treatment of aphantasia.

7. Burn on the retina

Popular rake. Spots remaining on the retina after closing the eyes while looking at a light bulb. From all sides and as objectively as possible, this is definitely not imagination. Yes, absolutely. How exactly. And also harmful.

8. Mental imagination

Representing the sensations of looking at something instead of generating a real picture. The difference is like seeing a thing and feeling that you saw it. Eyes don't move, this is the most important difference. The graphics are not real, it's just a feeling, and it makes itself felt.

Fantasists are often unaware that someone else has other methods of presentation. A real work of the imagination, like in a movie plot, they call a "hallucination."

Weak mental representation develops for everyone. Can't survive without it. Responsible for calculating distances and interactions with objects. For example, for the ability to hit a thrown ball in the right direction. How do you figure out where the ball will hit? In this manner.

Strong mental representation generates sensations from looking at amazing things, which allows you to imagine more powerfully than in other types of imagination, because. You don't need to draw the real picture. You can look at least at billions of objects - these are just the sensations of looking, but reliable.

9. Nagual, magical reality

I saw it once, I won't say much. Sensations are physically different from imagination in that you look, as it were, with the periphery of vision, but suddenly this periphery begins to look at the center and there you see something. Guide on it - in principle, all the books of Castaneda. I said I'll mention all what you can see...

II. Unified Theory of Imagination

1. Causes of Imagination

You have to learn to live. And preparation for life in mammals occurs through the game. It allows you to achieve a result in a deliberately safe simulated reality - to play - without putting yourself at risk. That allows you to learn. Without such training, one would have to learn to move, hunt, etc. in practice, which is almost guaranteed to kill. Many predators teach their pets how to hunt with the help of the game, but the individual itself can learn just as well.

Humans, and presumably many of the largest-brained animals - elephants, dolphins, monkeys - received a decisive advantage that even allowed one of the species to develop to the level of an intelligent race. From now on, the game does not need the environment and objects. You can play inside your own head. Those. to form a safe reality and on its basis to model a situation leading to the achievement of a result. The training is more advanced than primitive animal play.

Without any imagination, human existence is impossible. Remember the dead animals on the roads. They cannot cross the street because they have no imagination. There is no simulated reality to calculate where a car will be in a few seconds based on its speed and direction. Throw a stone or a stick at a dog - it will bounce. Not because he can calculate the stone's motion vector, as a person does; an increase in the area occupied by the object on the retina of the eye leads to an unconditioned flight reflex to the side. No animal with a small brain can, for example, beat off a thrown object in the right direction. To do this, you need to simulate the motion vector.

Thus, even a person with afantasy - a complete lack of imagination in the usual usage of the word "imagination" - has the rudimentary idea needed to model situations. Otherwise, even crossing the road would be impossible.

2. Types of imagination

I am inclined to believe that the imagination is or is not, regardless of the channel of incoming information - vision, hearing, and so on. The development of the visual representation will improve the auditory. This is how practice shows: they did not develop separately among the respondents.

The main division of the imagination is mental and hypnagogic (spatial, I will call it external for simplicity). As a rule, one person uses one method all his life and uses the other very rarely. Mental, inner imagination is the very simulated reality needed for survival. In a person with aphantasy, it resembles a huge void in which there is wind, pressure and gravity. That is, there exists only nothing, but this nothing has a vector, force, mass, volume and all other physical parameters. With further development, the mental imagination acquires some kind of graphics, but it is very conditional and is rather a symbol, a sense of visibility, and not the visibility itself. It is very difficult to understand this, I can only say that this graphics will never and never turn into a full-fledged external imagination. It is useless to develop it for anything but purely spiritual and psychoanalytic purposes. Yes, it can open the door to the unconscious. This is where the benefit ends.

The mental imagination exists inside the head. When presented, the eyes do not move and do not want to move them. The pictures appear nowhere or behind the eyes, in the manner of headphones, in which the sound seems to be inside the skull.

In contrast, external imagination, which generates hypnagogic images (technically, it is also responsible for hallucinations, if any), allows you to imagine in great detail any experienced sensations, except for tactile ones.

(The nature of the tactile transmission of information goes beyond the scope of the material, there is a lot of everything and, in theory, schizophrenia is needed for a full-fledged tactile representation, indistinguishable from reality. I can only say that this is connected, among other things, with pain sensations, and the brain of a healthy person cannot cause pain to oneself, such assumptions, in short.)

External imagination does not allow you to model reality well, so mental imagination will still have to be used. Rather, it is a reproduction of the sensations received from the sensors with the help of the mind. It is easy to guess that this is not entirely healthy and is, in a sense, a mockery of nature. Sensors are given to give reliable information, while people have learned to imitate receiving information from them in order to satisfy their needs without changing the real world. The owners of the most developed external imagination, as a rule, achieve nothing in life. This is a pattern - one needs to work hard to visit the beach by the ocean, the other just needs to close his eyes and he already gets one hundred percent of the same feeling.

I will describe, perhaps, one example. For me, it's extremely reliable. My mother can easily remove any object from reality if she doesn’t like it, add or replace anything, change the weather outside the window, move into her own past and see it in full reality around her, call the people she needs and see them as if they were alive, at while reading the book, she moves into the described world and sees it the way she sees everything else. And she achieved very little in her life. Because I could get everything described just like that. Many people tense up, describe headaches when trying to imagine too much; it is easier for her to snap a finger. Incidentally, the fact that I had aphantasy indicates that imagination is not hereditary.

External imagination develops according to the principle of breaking through the barrier. It represents a certain danger to the mind, and therefore a strong barrier is installed between it and a person by default, which must be broken through for a long time and stubbornly. It is thinnest in childhood, so it is extremely difficult for an adult to develop imagination from scratch. However, the development of an already existing imagination is not only possible, but also a fairly typical pathology - people in their 30s and 40s, having already raised their children and strengthened at work, have a lot of free time and think too much into imaginary worlds, which leads to a loss of reason. They discover that these worlds have become more real than their reality, that they no longer want to return to the real world, and the images have become more alive than ever.

Theoretically, the barrier is broken through by a large number of impacts on it, i.e. the development of a strictly external imagination. I'm doing it, stay tuned. Possibly many years. The mental imagination never develops the external, otherwise any fans of fantasizing would have an external imagination, but not everyone has it. And how would his erotic fantasies develop ... Unfortunately, mental internal images useless.

3. Imagination in different people

Everything starts in childhood.

Suppose there are two children. The first parents are middle class, loving and educated. They buy him puzzles, constructors, buy a tablet or PC early, give him consoles and teach him how to play minecraft.

The second child's parents are not very good. They don’t buy toys, sometimes they beat them, he got a PC only for studying when he was already an adult, he didn’t play games as a child.

So. Guess which of the children will have better imagination. Of course ... the second.

Everything in the body and life of a person adapts to the circumstances, and the imagination will develop in the same way if there is a need for it. The first child does not need to imagine anything - he has everything before his eyes. He can assemble a puzzle, build a house in minecraft or from a constructor, the answer to the question about the universe will be given to him by his mother.

The second child will build a house in his head, he will adapt what he finds for toys, and he will have to come up with answers to questions about the world himself.

It is also easy to guess from these examples why contemporaries have such a terrible imagination compared to ancient people who saw gods and mythical creatures in the real world with their own eyes. In modern times, pagan religions no longer work, because people cannot imagine so actively. The toys are too good and interactive; The answers to questions about the world have already been given, there is no need to think it through. And so on.

Imagination is generated by the unconscious (which proves at least its unpredictability, i.e., something outside of consciousness is responsible for it) and therefore is largely dependent on psychological factors and practically does not depend on physiological, except perhaps substances that affect the brain. A window to the world of the unconscious can also be opened by associations, memories… Or by mistake it can be closed forever.

So there are weird things. Someone can imagine only in a good mood, someone - only sitting. And everyone has different levels.

Approximately 5% of men have aphantasia. Not uncommon for the first child in the example. It is such a thick barrier that nothing can penetrate through it. Only the skill of using mental imagination is developed in the minimum amount that is needed to cross the road or calculate the distances to objects.

As a rule, poor imagination or aphantasy is associated with the auditory type of perception. Presumably, this is due to the fact that music awakens its own type of perception - sensual and moving. A mental representation is enough for this perception, music lovers and other auditory people use it, they simply did not need to destroy the barrier. They fell in love with music precisely because of the strong barrier that prevents them from loving other arts.

Also, the mental imagination suppresses the external one, since at the same time the mind can only look at one thing - the real world, the changed real world, mental pseudo-graphics or external imagination. So listening to music requires a constant shift in the type of imagination, which makes the task of representation very difficult. Regardless of whether the music is playing from the speakers or in the head.

Well, the last important difference is gender. It seems strange, but women almost always have a very thin barrier and can easily imagine. Apparently, this is due to the female way of looking at the world - it cannot be changed, only used. Men build buildings and ships, lay communications, terraform the earth, repair equipment, even drive conditional nails and assemble cabinets. This requires the work of abstract thinking, for which the mental imagination is sufficient. Women, on the other hand, must adapt to what is happening, it is important for them to remember the images, and not to know how it all works inside and how it works. External imagination with rich images allows you to cope with the task better, you willy-nilly have to develop it.

4. Is a dream an imagination?

Many people unequivocally describe a dream as a manifestation of the imagination. Just not which one. The issue is up for debate at the very least. The scientific theory of Pigarev is as follows: in sleep mode, the body will switch to inspection mode internal organs, and the neurons of the brain, instead of their usual activities, are engaged in supporting immunity and similar technical things. It follows (my conclusion) that when neurons, for example, of vision, are engaged in checking the intestines, we perceive it as if we are seeing something. If we remember a dream. After all, neurons work, and we receive information from them, but not the one that is needed. This is a good theory about what actually happens in a dream. Usually dreams are repetitive, the same locations, often in the same order - the brain follows the program of checking and supporting the body. Perhaps the very wooden house that we pass by in dreams means the adjustment of the immunity of the spleen ...

Is it so obvious, after such an assumption, that a dream is just imagination? In general, in a dream, unlike imagination, you can fully touch objects, everything smells fully there, the whole range of sensations is possible. In my opinion, sleep is not only imagination, or not imagination at all. Nevertheless, it helps the development of representation by breaking through the barrier between reality and the imagined. For example, the remnants of sleep after waking up help to believe in an imaginary thing, making it more real for a short time. And it thins the barrier.

For this reason, I will leave lucid dreams out of the text. They have nothing to do with the imagination, as far as I can see, almost nothing. I have been in them many times, but it did not help to develop the imagination. Moreover, getting into the OS, I could use the usual imagination in the same way, and it worked according to the same principle as in reality. Those. they are separate mechanisms.

5. Imagination in tulpaforce

Local information for the tulpaforce community. Let's get to the most interesting. The tulpa lives behind the barrier. She is an imaginary being. Nothing but the unconscious, by definition, can act on its own. In the presence of a barrier, its systemic destruction facilitates communication with the tulpa, i.e. constant destruction of reality through a serious attitude to the imagined. But here the imagination shows itself from an unusual side - it is able not only to generate images approximately on demand, but also to connect with the world of the unconscious.

For empirical knowledge of what is the unconscious, use or simply go down the stairs in any world that you can even partially see, in the external imagination or mental. To the very bottom. The point is not to find something at the end, but to go down so far that the mind begins to weaken and control is lost. The images will become more and more independent until you feel that this world is on its own. Many different creatures live there and various unreal events take place.

The tulpa is created there. Thus, ordinary fantasies about her or attempts to hear her voice in ordinary thoughts are an attempt to break through the barrier, taking seriously what we usually consider nonsense. But not her actual voice. The tulpa does not form immediately, but this process is very fast for people who are used to imagining for hours, because. they have already trained in similar processes. And when she lives fully, she will be just another being behind the barrier.

There is no contact with the world of the unconscious by ordinary methods. Generally. Yes, not at all. No, you can't feel what's going on there. No, this is not an exception. Yes, not at all. No, that doesn't count either. And this is also a delusion.

The human mind cannot comprehend that there are things that it cannot comprehend. It's like asking who created God.

It is hard to believe that beings live there - archetypes - independently thinking and somehow interacting right now, but Jung convincingly proved this, and in an ordinary dream it is self-evident. If a person is alone in the head, then who is responsible for the behavior of all the other characters? Who comes up with their replicas, actions in real time? Why are they so unpredictable?

Tulpa is not an archetype, you can tell for a very long time why, but it's easier to face the archetypes yourself and understand that this is a completely different field. So a tulpa is not an Anima or Animus, just like anything else. Learn to remember dreams, analyze the behavior of the characters and realize that the tulpa is not at all like them in anything. It also follows from this that in an ordinary dream she herself does not appear, she can only dream like anyone else.

You cannot feel the unconscious, but you can track it and communicate with it through communication interfaces. The most popular interfaces are magic and old religions. New religions adapted to abstract thinking modern man, they have lost their sacredness, through Buddhism, Islam and Christianity inner world no longer see. Magic can help, but not any, and there is a lot of garbage that will take a very long time to weed out. Therefore, according to the above methods with a conductor or descent down, it still looks like the best option.

Learning to recognize and analyze the symbols returned by the unconscious with the help of the imagination is all the more difficult, fortunately, we do not need this at all. I was just explaining what was going on. The unconscious is a huge world that has its own thinking. It is no more stupid than our conscious thinking, but it is extremely difficult to interact with it, we are just in different universes and speak different languages. Therefore, addressing it with primitive messages, repeating them over and over again in different manners, somehow still succeeds, but it does not understand complex speech. It perceives thoughts especially poorly, if at all. So at first, it seems to be a much more useful activity to exchange images with the tulpa, rather than words. By default, she does not own the human method of thinking or communication at all, otherwise it will not be an imaginary creature, but a stupid fantasy. (An exception is people who practiced a lot to imagine even before the force.) Remember, texts in the form of an image are especially difficult to remember, a picture is somehow easier to remember ...

Things the unconscious is incompatible with are text, speech, numbers, self-importance, and self-centeredness. You will not be able to reach the unconscious with these things in your head, and even more so in the message itself.

The development of external imagination, i.e. breaking through the barrier or thinning it, facilitates access to the unconscious, and also allows you to deceive your mind, forcing you to see and hear what is not there. So this is the most important point in the development of their tulpa, not counting their own work in teaching human speech.

In a nutshell, about who still lives in the unconscious: there are archetypes of beings, places and events, sensory responses to incidents and images, unborn thoughts that have not yet been filtered for access to consciousness (it was Freud who was catching them), the memory of what is happening in dreams, which is activated when entering a dream and turns off when waking up, as well as a bunch of anomalies not of this world, which cannot be explained on the fingers of a militant atheist and a science pop fan.

Unfortunately, even I cannot give a clear explanation of exactly what mechanism forms the tulpa. Maybe it's for the best. But it is absolutely clear that imagination is the key to communicating with her.

III. How do we see reality and imagine?

IV. How to cure aphantasy

How can you tell if you have an aphantasy? Let's divide readers into groups:

1. Poor understanding of the topic and thinking that they are related to the problem, although in fact they are all right.
2. Poorly imaginative and thinking they have aphantasy because they heard about it somewhere.
3. Having once imagined, perhaps in early childhood, but received on top of it the so-called “Veil” (fade glasses).
4. Really suffering from aphantasy.

This section of the Superguide will help people of groups 2, 3 and 4. Techniques are unique and can be useful for those who have no problems.

If you have a certain picture in the space in front of you with your eyes closed or open, it lasts for at least a couple of seconds, without losing its shape and scale, but it is poorly detailed, you do not feel suffering when you try to call it and everything seems fine, but this is not enough Your imagination is not that weak. You are so advanced that you need other guides.

If, when you close your eyes, you see a picture of the real world for a short time, but you can’t do anything else - you have some kind of imagination, you are in the second group and you will find something for yourself in the section “What to do when imagination appeared” towards the end.

I have already met the problem of the veil more than once, but not so often as to identify statistics or track the exact cause. One day, the imagination simply disappears forever and almost completely - any picture evoked “in the outside world” (when it seems that you can reach the visible with your hand, this is external imagination) is covered with some kind of muddy film, it is described as fog or smoky glass. This is presumably due to a change in the way we look at the world and think about it, but it takes a very deep soul-searching to notice this. So far, there have been so few examples that there were no people who managed to solve this problem, because. no one needed it - there were no tulpaforcers among them. Try to learn the same techniques and repeat the same path as in aphantasy, write your story to me and if you really need to heal this veil, we will try to come up with it together.

If you really don't have nothing when you close your eyes, even for a fraction of a second, if you never did not see images or graphics when reading books, or if your images are “somewhere in nowhere” and instantly transform, fall apart - you have aphantasy. This guide is written just for you.

1. Theory

If you want to achieve something with this guide, you necessarily you need to read the Unified Theory of the Imagination above - otherwise there will be a complete misunderstanding of the terminology, causes and effects. Here and below, I will freely use terms like “mental imagination”, implying that you have read the Unified Theory. If you are confused with the words “fantasy”, “afantasy”, “imagination” and “hallucination”, then here is the exact definition of the terms:

Vision- uncontrolled, spontaneous and safe creation of external imagination. For example, Jung wakes up one morning, and a luminous crucifix hangs in the air by his bed. He thinks, yeah, a vision. A visible tulpa is a vision, it is self-managed. The word is not negative, but the recipient of the vision is still a “weird weirdo” and will not be hired, for example. It is customary to keep silent about visions.

Word hallucination in Russian it has an exclusively negative connotation and is often interpreted only as a product of a mental deviation or a harmful manifestation of the imagination. Schizophrenic-kun's tulpa is a hallucination. Word hallucination in English usage, I often encountered it in a completely everyday sense and is not unequivocally negative. We will assume that hallucination and hallucination are something like the word “artist”, which in Russian does not mean an artist in any way.

Fantasy- dreams, often abstract and completely devoid of graphics, sounds. The owners of a developed imagination can be accompanied by an external imagination, why not.

Afantasia- a term meaning the absence of external imagination. Pure confusion, there is a story with both agnostics and gnostics. An agnostic is a school-cynic “I don’t care if there is a God, I’ll tell everyone about it urgently” or a philosopher with about the same thing in his head. A gnostic is an elite religious believer, a heretic in relation to the mainstream church. As you can see, these are not opposites, but generally different stories.

Finally, under the word imagination”both Russians and foreigners inappropriately bring down everything that has and has nothing to do with the listed terms. Non-existent insects crawl on you and you yell? Imagination! Does anyone have an HCV? Yes, he imagines himself! Someone figured out how to make money more money for a company, or found the best topic for an essay? He has an imagination, I envy him! And in our environment there is only one word usage: imagination = external imagination.

The idea of ​​defeating aphantasy is based on the principle of the Barrier - take it as a metaphor, although some have seen the Barrier in person. The approach to solving the problem of the Barrier is to act on it as often as possible, without really bothering with the strength of the impact. Weak, strong - the main thing is to do a lot and often. Sooner or later, it will thin out and the picture will first appear, then it will be held better and better. Imagination is not a muscle that needs to be developed, it is about accessing the resource “external imagination” that does not need to be developed. And we need to break the barrier that blocks access, or make it thinner.

What is this Barrier? A two-component barrier that you can visually perceive from the diagrams above. So far, we are talking about only one component of the Barrier - one that can simply be thinned or broken. The instinct of self-preservation, which prevents you from imagining, because this can easily lead to insanity. Well, since you are already an adult, now you are in charge of your own mind, and you will be able to cope with the problems that breaking through the Barrier may well lead to.

The second component of the Barrier resembles a muscle, it requires training, it is your ability to predict perception. More on this in the section on perception below. While this is too complicated to describe in a nutshell, it is not necessary to know this topic at the stage of aphantasy treatment.

The barrier (its first component) is broken strictly by external (hypnagogic) imagination, by no means internal (mental). First you have to get used to the idea that mental imagination, if you have it and you have developed it, is completely, well, simply absolutely useless. It's trash. Even if you could catch a glimpse of the tulpa with it and so on. But it's just your brain's neural network image recognition buffer or something like that. Also, the mental imagination is responsible for generating too complex things in the external imagination, for example, a person imagines a wonderland and makes a field in it, and the mental imagination generates millions of blades of grass - this is its limit and the only application. Separately, millions of blades of grass will not give us the whole world. Especially if they are not “attached” to a three-dimensional volumetric world in space. Or models. And the owners of mental imagination see these images precisely “in nowhere”, and not in space.

A little about sleep: working with Lucid Dreaming in practice has shown zero effectiveness in forcing and developing the imagination for people with aphantasy. As for sleep deprivation, it's absolutely useless. Once I did not sleep for five days. Not on purpose, I couldn't sleep. There was nothing even remotely similar to glitches and hallucinations, because I had an aphantasy! Probably, an overdose of hallucinogens of any strength will give the same effect: all this affects the imagination, and if it is absent, then there will be no effect. It also makes no sense for people with a weak imagination to do this - your glitches will not be stronger than your abilities ... As for ordinary sleep - its use is very important in a key technique, more on that below.

2. Workouts

Now that you've mastered the theory, the training will be.... Simple.

Perhaps, looking at the page number, you are wondering why you couldn’t just write the workouts right away and be done with it. Superguide.

It is possible to write workouts right away. Subject to your unconditional faith in the Teacher. Which is not here. Because you have to persevere in doing things without feedback, anyone will quit doing them without positive reinforcement. Weeks, months of work without even signs of progress ... The theory gives an understanding of why it took so long.

Positioning training

An important accessory workout that seems to only need to be done successfully once in a lifetime. You will have to work hard for a week or two, but it will not be constantly and clearly visible when the training is successful and you can stop. Five to ten minutes a day mixed with other techniques is enough.

The training helps you understand what external imagination looks like in general, and forever gives you the opportunity to work with scale, therefore it is better to do it as early as possible before getting imagination, and, presumably, without doing it, it is impossible to learn to imagine from scratch at all.

Feel the boundaries of vision in the current position of the head. Somewhere near the bones, on the edges of the eye sockets, is the edge of vision. Feel the top and bottom of the edge of vision. Do not move your head in the process, it is important to understand exactly the limits of vision in a certain position of the skull. Move your eyes up, down, left, right, look for those very boundaries. The field of view within the head position will be approximately oval in shape. Return your eyes to the center. Now let's measure distances. Mentally.

Left edge of the field of view = 0%. Center = 50%. Right edge of the field of view = 100%. We do the same for the top and bottom.

Now you can, without moving your head, measure the size of visible objects and their position in X and Y. For example, everyone on the tables has speakers or some such object. My left column is 12% to the left of the center (38% comes out, but you can also from the center, if more convenient) and a couple of percent below the center. You can help yourself with your hands in the process, using them to understand distances. You still can't move your head.

The column width is 4% of the field of view. For simplicity, think how many such objects, not three-dimensional, but, as it were, flat projections on the retina of the eye, will fit into the field of view. Comes out 25 pieces. And now close our eyes.

And you need to accurately reproduce the center, edges of the field of view, the height and dimensions of the object. If you can’t abstractly figure out where it should be, place your hands at such a distance, as if showing, like a fisherman, what size fish he caught, so that the object fits into the distance between the hands - visually, on the retina. It's as if your field of view is a monitor with a game, and you select a 3D object with a 2D frame. When you finish counting, open your eyes.

Opachki, the object is in the wrong place and the wrong size! Pichal-bida! What do you want from imagination if you don't learn how to do it? Practice understanding sizes. This is the essence of training. My position and size after closing my eye are already approximately the same as the real object. Training is important!

Eye focus training

This is an important training of simple-sight, without which even think about the external imagination. You will have to repeat periods until you learn to imagine. The bottom line is that people with external imagination are able to focus their closed eyes. You do not know how, most likely, so you have to learn.

Look at any object in space, but not at screens, inscriptions or printed materials. Look with a fixed gaze for a couple of seconds. Close your eyes quickly. Do you feel they are moving and the focus has gone astray? When you open your eyes, you need to focus again. Moreover, you have to look for an object with your eyes if you are still bad at positioning training. The task is to learn not to lose focus for at least a few seconds. So that when you open it, you no longer have to focus again.

Then, when it works, you need learn to look into space eyes closed . So that they do not “park” when their eyes are closed, but behave in the same way and focus in the same way as with open eyes. As if you had the opportunity to look through the eyelids, which is not there - teach your eyes to behave in this way in advance. This technique is strictly required to continue learning.. With parked eyes, you will have no external imagination.

And finally, for the future of irl vision at high levels of imagination, you need to learn to look directly into the air and look for some kind of black haze in it, which is not there. And thus focus directly on any point in space. Which is empty. It's like looking at the air one meter away from you, two meters away, and so on. This is the most important part of hirl-introducing your tulpa, but you can put this practice aside for now.

see through training

I don’t know at what point it will start working, but it started very early for me. We look at a black object, matte, absorbing light. Or white matte. We are trying to see the boundaries of the object behind, for example, if the object were transparent, the edge of the table would be visible behind it. Try to keep the objects behind not too complex and clearly sticking out from behind the edges of the object, make the task very easy. And then just look through. First, you can look at the object behind just like that, then, without losing the focus of your eyes, transfer your vision to a black object. You will have to struggle for a long time, inventing how to look directly through a black object, concentrating the focus of vision on the object behind. And lo and behold, suddenly you begin to see. Maybe not on the first day. But you see the continuation of the object behind right inside black object. In 3D, you can even move your head and still see in 3D. At the level of seeing the border, no more. This is very strange, but you will really see it, it will not seem like something like “imagined”, no, you will look and see point-blank. Over time, it begins to seem that all the objects in the world are actually slightly transparent. And one has only to want and peer, as you begin to see what is behind.

I don't give guarantees. But it worked for me very long before other successes. Try every day, success will deafeningly inspire the dreamer.

Post-sleep vision technique

The main technique that plays the same role in the treatment of aphantasia as the tank in the First World War - in our case, this tank is needed to break through the Barrier. But she requires eye positioning and focusing techniques, so you need to first master them at least well.

Everything is built on visions that are possible for the first few seconds after sleep. The brain has not yet adjusted to the wakefulness mode, and if you try to imagine in these seconds, the same mechanism that leads to falling asleep is turned on, but body movements do not allow paralysis to turn on. It turns out to be a dream. As you know from the Unified Theory, sleep is not imagination or is unlikely to be fully, we need it because the control of post-sleep vision is about the same as the control of the imagination - this is such a simulator in which you can feel yourself already having an external imagination and understand how it is done, how the eyes move, how graphics appear, that's all.

You can see a tulpa in your room in just a couple of days after mastering two workouts. More precisely, her image, and not herself, but nonetheless. The technique is done in different ways depending on the progress in it:

Level I- you lie still and see through your closed eyes the world around you and your body. A subtype of lucid dreaming.

Level II- you can move and see through closed eyes. Movement ensures that this is not a dream.

Level III- you can see the altered real world with your eyes open and move, even stand up.

Of course, the effect lasts for several seconds, and the mind is somewhat clouded. I'm at level III, the other day I woke up and was trying to see something, I stumbled across the window and started looking. I looked through it at the street. Then it slowly dawned on me that there was no window in that wall. Indeed, it was daylight outside the real windows, but it was still dark in this window. The effect wore off and the window slowly dissolved...

To be fair, I have come across cases where people said they were able to maintain this ability forever, and not for a few seconds. I could not. Perhaps some of you will be lucky? But it helps tremendously to work with the imagination for the first time in my life, it gives me the opportunity to practice. Still, dream and imagination are different, but in terms of graphics management - almost none.

So, get used to the idea that you always saw such visions, but forgot along with dreams, you just need to learn how to remember them. It's not a big problem. If you encounter difficulties with this, read about remembering dreams, this is a separate big topic, a voice recorder on the phone by the bed will help. In general, the point is to do eye focus training the first seconds after waking up, the difference is that you can see something. The dream generation mechanisms will show the picture. Try to see the room around you in these seconds. Specifically, then it will be possible to do, if you are not lazy with training. Failure to focus the eyes correctly immediately means failure in trying to call graphics. Failing to position and zoom means failing to see the room around with your eyes closed and as a result no picture will be called up, or you will fall asleep instead of trying to look at what is around the body. Walls, at least. Summoning characters is the hardest thing to do, but graphics modification is generally possible. So you can imagine the room with your tulpa. So it goes.

If difficulties arise, you can try to start looking at your legs or arms through your closed eyes, already switching your attention to the environment from them. By different reasons it's easier to do.

So, day after day you will live, improving your skills in training and every awakening trying to turn on post-sleep vision. Yes, it will not work on the first attempts and it is difficult to say exactly when. Understand, no one cares about people with aphantasy and there is no other way to defeat it. You have to work and endure without complaining. Nobody else will help you. Just perseverance and patience. Be patient, work, wait. Change approaches and look for loopholes. We are exploiting a system bug here, and not having fun in an amusement park.

I gave you a working technique and detailed theory. I was one on one with aphantasy, having no starting point at all. There was nothing on the Internet. And I spent five years in the fight against it, not receiving positive reinforcements and doubting every second that victory is even possible and that I am doing at least one thing right. No need to write to me about what is difficult for you - I will get very angry and at least ban you.

Keeping all this going on... Sooner or later when doing the eye focus training, looking at the subject, closing the unfocused eyes, you will notice such a thing. The picture will remain for a tiny fraction of a second. It's like it doesn't dissolve right away. The eyes are already closed. But the picture is still there.

Congratulations. This means that you have reached Imagination Level 1 and have defeated Aphantasy. What are you waiting for? Another half Superguide ahead!

3. Things to Do When Imagination Happened

Also, the section is dedicated to people who already have an imagination level of 1.

Eye closure technique

For people with weak imagination. I suspect that without this technique it is impossible to move further, but it is so difficult and long to explain that just take my word for it, it will be useful in the future and exciting now.

Are you able to close your eyes? Of course not. I will teach you. The master class starts here.

You can close your eyes Quickly and Very Quickly, getting a different effect. Very Fast - this is even faster than you can now. Well, in general, as quickly as possible in principle.

Look at the object, focus your eyes on it, Close them quickly without defocusing. One of three things happen:

1. You screwed up and your eyes defocused. In this case, a blurry and unfinished picture of the world as a whole will flash for a fraction of a second. This is useful for some things, remember this way of getting graphics.
2. You haven't lost focus, and you've retained the subject more or less as a picture.
3. You managed not only not to lose the picture of the object, but also to strengthen it, having received a three-dimensional detailed positioned and scaled model.

For some reason, gleaming small metal objects like doorknobs are easiest to come by. It is incredibly difficult or impossible to save what is depicted on the screen, inscriptions, drawings or printing. Only 3D small objects.

So, to save graphics, it is useful to both Quickly and Very Quickly close your eyes. The feature of the Very Fast Closing is that the brain is not yet ready for it and it’s a little crazy that the vision is already blocked, but he is not aware of it yet.

This happens in a fraction of a second after a Very Rapid Eye Closure. The Quick Closing procedure manages to get approved by all authorities and everything is ready in advance. So Very Fast at first - the best option, but requires focus on the subject. It is better to save landscapes simply by Fast, besides, this is not a brain trick, but a full-fledged training, you should not neglect it during prolonged pumping.

Landscapes and “still lifes” from a bunch of objects are easy to inspect with a quick close, moving your eyes over them if the picture lingers long enough. But you need to come to terms with the idea that only the center is preserved more or less clearly, along the edges - something blurry. If you do not reconcile, then the picture will fall apart, because. refinements will be required that weak imagination cannot provide. It will prefer to cut down the graphics, well, or die from overheating, if such an analogy is appropriate.

Continuing the story of brain deception - over time, you can learn to start the opening of the eyes and immediately interrupt it. Thus, if you close your eyes very quickly, a completely reliable picture will remain for a while, and as soon as it starts to fade, you give a signal to open your eyes and immediately block this opening, the picture is displayed a second time, restoring and amplifying the original. So I learned to see 3D models.

The goal of the training is to learn how to hold the called graphics for as long as possible. Repetition will give everything.

Reality Substitution Technique

Built on previous technology. Especially on combinations of the maximum number of tricks. Use the strongest versions of the eye-closing technique as possible with a minimum interval between applications, reduce this interval to half a second or more. So that reality and imagination constantly continue to alternate, and even at such a speed that the brain will no longer be able to distinguish one from the other. Over time, it becomes more and more difficult for him to understand this and it somehow becomes irrelevant. "BUT. I look somewhere. Is this reality or imagination? My honor has been violated. I am no longer an accurate tool for understanding the world.”

Indeed, the reduction of the interval leads to the loss of the ability to recognize one and the other. As a result, the ability to work with the imagination continues to increase. And to what extent - I myself do not know, as I said, my imagination did not develop to high levels. For now.

Finally, I will give you a way to get a hallucination. Use the reality substitution technique on any one object lying on a table or other large free surface, and at some point in time, having prepared everything in advance, close your eyes for a long time, fixing the focus on the object. Next, without moving your eyes in the sockets and without losing focus, move your body to the left or right, making sure that the focus can be superimposed on the table without problems, i.e. without changing the distance from the head to the table. Open your eyes and the object memorized by a tired brain is generated in the same place where it was generated for the last few minutes, well, minus the fact that the real object is not there ... Defense mechanisms cut in, systems screech, the picture fails, a steady feeling of a roof exit and animal horror rises from depths of the mind. This is a hallucination.

On the same principle, but light and without violence, an imposition on reality is built for people of the 3rd level of imagination who want to grow to the 4th level. We close our eyes, fixing the picture, turn our head and open our eyes. With a developed imagination, the fixed picture should try to fit into the new environment, well, or it can be helped with this. This will teach you how to take the first steps to overlay on the real world, although the technique is more complicated and I myself still know how to do it almost in any way, so in Superguide misses. Maybe in future editions?

V. Black World




Technique for the development of the development of imagination for people 0.5 - 2 levels. Those with aphantasy (level 0) won't be helped, it's too early for them to do that.

Described here are ways I found to get a weak wonderland without the ability to edit, and this is a breakthrough for a person with a weak imagination.

1. Let's get started

The technique is entirely based on working with eye focus and darkness. You will need to either stay overnight, or set an alarm every day, or find a place where it is Totally Dark, vaguely distinguishable contours of objects. This is for the first time, then you will need a 100% dark room.

First, let's test whether you need it at all. Close your eyes. Try to look around you through your eyelids. See the world around? If yes, then you are too cool for this guide. If it doesn't work out, repeat the same in the dark, closet or room without light. Still not out? Ok, guide for you.

2. Light

Light harms the imagination. For example, children with imagination are afraid of the dark, seeing the outlines of monsters in it, but not afraid of bright light, although visibility in it is also poor.




Look at the picture. The same landscape is first depicted with normal lighting, then with increased light and a corresponding blur, then this enhancement and blur is enhanced to such an extent that it is almost impossible to see something. This is exactly what will happen if you try to use the Black World in bright light and weak imagination. But I can note that in the course of practice I began to see in an increasingly bright light, for example, now you don’t need to turn off the PC monitor to see the room through your eyelids, before even such a light destroyed the picture.

If you with your weak imagination close your eyes during the day, you will see something like in the right picture. That is nothing.

3. Focus closed eyes

An extract from the section on the treatment of aphantasy above, on how to learn to work with the focus of the eyes, if you do not know how to focus them after closing:

Look at any object in space, but not at screens, inscriptions or printed materials. Look with a fixed gaze for a couple of seconds. Close your eyes quickly. Do you feel they are moving and the focus has gone astray? When you open your eyes, you need to focus again. Moreover, you have to look for an object with your eyes if you are still bad at positioning training. The task is to learn not to lose focus for at least a few seconds. So that when you open it, you no longer have to focus again.

Then, when it works out, you need to learn to look into space with your eyes closed. So that they do not “park” when their eyes are closed, but behave in the same way and focus in the same way as with open eyes. As if you had the opportunity to look through the eyelids, which is not there - teach your eyes to behave in this way in advance. This technique is strictly mandatory for continuing education. With parked eyes, you will have no external imagination.

Let's try to grab a picture. In the dark (not absolute - the first time training with low light), look at the object brighter - a light shade. There are no colors in really dark lighting, except for the illusion of blue, if you see them, then you have a developed imagination, google the device of the eye, this cannot be ...

Fix your eyes, close quickly, trying not to lose focus. Does not work? Try slowly. Pay special attention to trying to cover the object halfway with eyelids, trying to see the invisible part remaining on top.

Even if nothing happens, it's okay, it's just a way to find the right distance.

4. About the accessibility distance

Let's take as zero the point where you feel yourself - approximately behind the eyes. For the maximum, we will take the distance at which you can interact with the world with your hands without stretching them out - you can easily take an object, for example. Comfort zone, personal space.

The trick of seeing the external imagination is that it still does not imitate real distances with the focus of the eyes, at least on a small level. The eyes should be focused at about ½ or ¾ of the distance. Closing your eyes in the dark, try to look exactly at this distance, seeing the world there.

Does not work? It is difficult to explain and even more difficult to understand. Especially to those who have not seen the imaginary world.

Try to see the world at different distances, in general. It doesn't have to be where it really is. Imaginative people are better at reporting that their eyes focus when looking, but not in the same way as when looking at the real world. As if they had to be focused to a different distance to look at the same objects. Objects under their noses do not require different eye focus from objects far away. Look under your breath - and you see what is far away.

5. Fixation

The most important thing in the imagination is fixation on it. Feeling the importance of what you are looking at. And again, the language is not suitable for describing what is happening, it is difficult to understand, turn on the right hemisphere when reading.

The more important what you focus on, the more real it is and the more precisely it exists. For example, you see a dark blurry spot - light and shadow slightly break through the eyelids. Focus on what that spot should be. For now, maybe you don't have any imagination yet, more on that later. For now, watch. Is it a piece of furniture? Cast shadow? What are you looking at? You can speak out loud, in some cases with the imagination, such concretization helps. Better yet, tell someone about what you see. Quite well - to pronounce a bunch of people. This increases the importance and real existence of the object.

How long have you been paying attention to the patterns on people's clothes? Patterns on tiles or wallpaper in a public place? It's like they don't exist. Believe me, people simply do not see them, in their head the imagination forms a blurry something, because the patterns are insignificant. And only a person who seriously deals with these patterns, such as a designer, sees them. Others don't see them at all. In their perception, these meaningless things do not exist. That's why they don't see them.

You attach significance to something with your attention, visual imagination works just like that - we increase the significance of what is visible in all ways, incl. careful scrutiny. The Black World is good because you really see something, and it really exists, you cannot deny this fact. So look not at "something", but at what you see. Blurry, dark. Increase importance.

In the world of imagination, a tree falling in the forest makes no sound. There is no one to give this sound significance.

Fixation does not last long, up to several minutes. Being in the dark, I see the surrounding space for two or three minutes, then I get tired and just go blind. Darkness around. I'll rest - and the picture is restored. So don't try to exhaust yourself, it makes no sense. Go ahead and act.

6. Darkness

At some point, you will realize that the shadows you see are too little like real looking. The first suspicions on the imagination. There will be many doubts, especially about the line between the eyelids - when you try to focus the eyes, they open a little and the light that breaks through gives part of the picture.

So, it's time to move on to a completely dark room.

I do not recommend a blindfold, because. it presses, making it difficult to focus, plus the mind will be absolutely sure that it is impossible to see something, while the eyes are blocked. Don't be surprised if there is no progress at all. We need even the weakest illusion of looking at the real world.

Go into the storage room / bathroom / cave (there are a lot of caves next to each city, I saw it in RPG). See with wide eyes.

Is anything visible? Shadows? Light? If something is visible in absolute darkness, then in fact it is not visible. As hard as it is to believe. I still can't believe I'm not seeing the real world. I stretch out my hand, I feel it - but there is nothing there that I see. But I believe in what I see.

The best method - after entering the room, spin around your axis many times, then in the opposite direction. Then start watching. By this time, you're guaranteed not to know where anything is. See anything? Extend your hand and feel. Oops. Yes, it's imagination. Wonderland looks like this. Our primitive. Welcome to the real Black World.

7. Looking in general

Above, I did not write in vain about significance. If you're already making some progress, it's time to think about improving. look at better world in general, not the object you are looking at right now. And again - remember about ½, ¾, you need to look for the world at a distance where it is best seen. Fix your attention on it, think about what you see, in any way possible.

It is also important that peripheral vision lends itself more easily to external imagination. Looking at the world as a whole, you greatly simplify your task, because. the edges are detailed much more readily than the center. When you can fix your attention properly, just practice every day until you can easily enter the Black World every time it is dark. And by feeling it with your hands, you can discover its illusory nature and imaginary nature.

VI. Perception

The real world is perception. What is happening in the head, decoding data from the sensors. I will not return to this issue, describe why science has proven this, and in religions / esotericism so, the whole blog is about this ... Thus, both external imagination and the real world are perception. The difference here is in the readings of the sensors.

It turns out that external imagination is also a forecast of perception in addition to perception. Is external imagination a prediction? No. See.

Real world:

Sensors -> Perception

External imagination:

Perception Prediction -> Perception

mental imagination:

Misformat Perception Prediction -> Forecast -> Forecast etc.

Mental imagination cannot turn into perception because the prediction is defective, wrong, not even three dimensional! Fantasists who could not move their eyes and generally predict perception correctly, in an attempt to develop prediction, developed something flawed. So is the nature of the external imagination and the mental one the same?

Even so, these phenomena are different, like a monkey and a person.

There is another dream:

Unmanaged Processes -> Perception

External imagination is uncontrollable in itself, just like the graphics in dreams, for example, or a drug trip! You control only the forecasting system. Which allows you to order the unconscious has a perception... If it meets all sorts of standards, i.e. correct format. The forecast format is correct - perception works out according to the forecast and you see the real world, the changed real world or the world in your perception is real, but in fact does not exist. The format is wrong - break off or get a mess of mental imagination, which generally works with bare forecasts and is limited to them.

Here it is, the two-component Barrier! Instincts don't want to paint perceptions based on a person's actions. there is a risk of insanity, this defense mechanism must be destroyed. And a person must learn to make more accurate forecasts, although even an ultra-accurate forecast with an unbroken protective mechanism of the imagination will not work.

So what about the main topic for us:

How to improve external imagination?

Oh ... External imagination, it turns out, in essence, a forecast that turns into perception, streaming generating more and more new forecasts, like frames in computer games, who knows. The game renders ~60 times per second (18 if you're a console player, hee hee), each time each frame is calculated by the processor + video card and rendered. it metaphor, just for understanding - the forecast gives rise to perception, perception reproduces an imaginary world or a changed real world, then a new forecast appears - you never know, you have moved in space - and a new perception is born, hence the problems when moving, when the picture changes a lot.

The first thing that allowed me to noticeably improve my imagination was my attitude to what was happening, as to a forecast. Not "I see something", or "it's a vague shadow", I see forecast. Like the weather forecast for tomorrow. Seeing that tomorrow there will be a sharp cold snap and rain, you are unlikely to count on warm weather, even if you understand that it may not rain, and not such a sharp cold snap, but there is some sense in the forecast - you believe that will be colder. But not 100%. This is the meaning of forecasts in the external imagination.

Not “I dimly see the refrigerator”, not “the object is practically invisible”, not even “I thought I saw”, but “ I see only a forecast of perception, perhaps it will turn into perception».

This changes everything, although not much yet. After all, intuitively, we are already looking for the best strategies, right? The materiel itself does not help much at this stage. We need training, searching, groping.

You can learn to predict everything more accurately, and the more accurate the forecast, the more likely it is to turn into a perception. Into an external imagination that works like the real world.

Everything that affects forecasts, allows you to predict more effectively, character traits, propensity to work with forecasts and the desire to assume, faith in assumptions and forecasts, conviction in conviction versus sincere faith... By the way, on this topic, a quote from a well-known fanfic that is useful for tulpaforcers:

Imagine: someone tells you that a dragon lives in his house. You answer that you want to see him. You are told that it is an invisible dragon. Fine, you say, in which case you want to hear it. You are told that it is a completely silent dragon. You announce that you will throw flour into the air to see its contours. They explain to you that flour passes through this dragon through and through. And, saying all this, the explainer already knows in advance which particular result of the experiment he needs to explain in his favor. He knows that everything will pass as if there were no dragon, he knows in advance what excuse he must invent. Perhaps this someone only claims that the dragon exists. Perhaps he believes that he believes that the dragon exists. This is called "belief in belief". But he doesn't really believe the dragon exists. You can be genuinely delusional about what your true beliefs are - most people don't notice the difference between believing in something and believing that it's right to believe it.

So. It seems that I received an Answer to the question that I asked all carriers of a developed external imagination: “How exactly do you represent?”

The answer is “I create a 3D prediction of what I want to achieve using a basic mental representation, like how I calculate the distance to an object, or how I figure out where a ball will bounce, or how I aim a ball at a basket. This prediction is accurate enough that if everything worked out, some invisible force creates reality at my request. When the forecast is inaccurate, I say I couldn't introduce” was never received.

VII. How to work more efficiently

To work with imagination and forcing, it is necessary to create the most comfortable conditions: it is advisable to temporarily stop communication with people from the “outside” world and the Internet in order to focus on the process, be calm, collected and solve all your mental and internal problems, or learn to put up with them otherwise the unconscious will work poorly or refuse to cooperate at all.

After creating the conditions, it is necessary to organize competent nutrition of the brain. Basically, it requires slow carbohydrates to work, they are also with a low glycemic index. Everything you need is made from them. Fast carbohydrates, they are also sugars, they are foods with a high glycemic index, they do not help so well because of the uneven impact. Roughly speaking, when consuming sweets (including fruits) in the body, the work of insulin is increased to accelerate the absorption of carbohydrates, as a result, most of it turns into fat folds, the smaller part helps the brain work. This impact is uneven, transient, and as a result, part of the time of the day you will have a good “burst” of the brain, and part of the time it will be deprived of the necessary substances.

Slow carbohydrates are called so because they are digested slowly and gradually supply the brain with everything necessary. There will be no crashes, depression, communication problems, decline, and, of course, unnecessary problems with imagination.

Mixing high GI and low GI carbs results in mixed results that are not good for tracking progress. Let's say your new imagination technique didn't work today, and you blame it on the technique, when in practice it's because the carbs weren't enough.

The issue is resolved by a complete transition to slow carbohydrates, at the same time you will lose weight if this is a problem. Once a day you need to consume 150+ gr. products with slow carbohydrates are oatmeal, millet, barley, in general, everything is popular, except for corn. Rice does not contain the right amount, you will have to eat more or refuse it. Also suitable as a source of low-glycemic carbohydrates are pasta made from second-class flour (peeled or buckwheat noodles) and bread from second-class flour. Yes, you need to look into the composition, and not believe the large inscription. Ignore any "healthy" foods with sugar in them.

Also, many people react poorly to disruptions in their sleep schedule. If you have such problems, you will have to accustom yourself to sleep at the same time.

You extremely Are you serious and want to learn as much materiel as possible? OK. So, after surfing the Internet in search of information on the topic, I found these books that I have read myself and on matters of imagination I can recommend to others.

1. General literature

K.G. Jung - Memories, Dreams, Reflections. As one who has read a lot of Jung, I recommend exactly this from his work, although the book seems to be autobiographical. But it is a personal view of the life of this person, his visions, hallucinations, the emergence of the idea of ​​Active Imagination that helps to understand the essence of the work as closely and humanly as possible. Many examples of the work of the imagination are given. Actually, the biographical part of the book is almost unimportant, and little attention is paid to it, mainly an autoanalysis of Jung's psyche. This person is quite easy and pleasant (you can see for yourself), so the book is quite exciting compared to the rest.

K.G. Jung - Man and his symbols. Traditionally Jung's first recommended book. In my opinion, there is simply very little information there, there is nothing like a list of at least the main, most frequently encountered archetypes. It is those who have read this one book that cover the Internet with nonsense about the fact that all the unconscious is Anima and Animus, and with other amateurishness. Harmful to read separately from the rest, in short.

K.G. Jung - Psychological types. Lots of useful information, which is excellent and useful in everything to one who already knows a lot about his nature. There are many descriptions of visions, hallucinations of people of the past and contemporaries of the author. With a good knowledge of the materiel, it is a storehouse of knowledge that can be properly used. Some passages almost directly teach how to work with tulpaforcing.

Charles Duhigg, Force of Habit- not about imagination, but about habits and organization of work, will help with forcing and training the imagination, will solve problems with a bunch of plugs. In essence, it is a simplified version of Castaneda's stalking techniques, but this is not esoteric, which is a plus for many. Companions who are lazy or don’t know what to do if they can’t set themselves up or organize an approach to business and how to schedule training - anjoy.

Carlos Castaneda, collected works - it makes no sense to consider books separately, they need to be read all and entirely. Much is refuted or clarified in the course of reading, you should not draw conclusions from the first books. Books change the worldview very much, this is a compound feed from the world of esotericism: with it, the fur of your pet-Warrior will be smooth and silky, it will play and jump like a kitten, because books contain all the nutritional elements necessary for a growing esoteric brain, from working on oneself - stalking - to the ability to bend everyone in DotA - Way of the Hunter. The most useful literature for tulpaforcers, it helps to break through the Barrier, you almost stop believing in reality. Readers are divided into three camps: those who unconditionally believe in the plot, who consider the books fake, and those who believe that Don Juan is fiction, like the whole plot, but the techniques there are real and K.K. really traveled around Mexico, asking shamans. The latter seems to me the most likely, take at least allies, allies, etc. - the first two books say that they stick out of all cracks and form an important part of the life of any magician, the remaining nine books do not no one mention of these creatures. The plot seems to be designed to make it easier for us to read, and it worked: the books are amazingly light and interesting. ~70% of the techniques described there work, the rest ~30% I did not check, because they are too complicated. Not recommended for reading last book, Magic Passes. She has a murky origin story and looks useless.

To those who under 22-23 years old, I strongly do not recommend reading Castaneda it will ruin your life. In general, it is not worth reading for someone who is against esotericism and does not want to risk his mind. best example- I. You've seen the blog, you can't call me gullible and uneducated, and I'm quite an adult. So, after reading Castaneda, I am quite seriously sure that the visible reality is a collective fantasy, that the Flyers exist (I saw them even before reading, but did not know the names of these things), and the world with the creatures that enslave us - too. And that a being from yet another world visited me personally. And that our world is a product of the Eagle. And people are like cattle on a farm under the control of an alien mind. Still want to read KK? Haven't changed your mind?

2. Theodule Ribot, Creative Imagination

It exists only in the format of a scan of a book in pre-revolutionary Russian, well, or foreign. Superguide - this is essentially the same information as there, but shorter, but fewer examples. The author, on the other hand, chewed almost everything he writes about, and substantiated it well. The book is at the end, since there is no point in reading it for those who read Superguide from my blog and the materials it links to. But if someone wants an authoritative scientist instead of me, or you are just used to reading books, please. Here is my book review:

Finished reading the book by Théodule Ribot. Reading went slowly, a lot of thought in the process. The most amazing thing is inside and out clever literature written in 1901, and yet the accuracy of the author's thought is suggestive of modern scientific rationalism. The author is in more difficult conditions than I am, because he does not have an obsession with the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bgetting the imagination; he already has it. For Theodule, the question is purely speculative, but his position is all the more valuable.

In fact, 95% of the book was already known to me in advance. But there is a lot of justification and evidence, and now I do not doubt the theories. If you want to get the same knowledge, but in short - scroll through my blog, in fact it and the book contain the same thing. The most valuable was found towards the end: the idea of ​​the consciousness of the imagination.

That is, the farther from consciousness, the stronger the imagination. Théodule Ribot gives some idea of ​​a "dreamer", a person to whom the conscious, real world is less important than the unconscious. That is enough: weakening the power of reality gives strength to the unconscious. Then, suddenly, follows almost word for word the idea of ​​the assemblage point and the luminosity of awareness from Castaneda, although he was not yet born at that moment. And it is described in exactly the same way, perhaps not by different positions of the assemblage point, but as if by different people that you become as the luminosity moves after the point. Such “crossovers”, when suddenly the author quotes another author who lived millennia or decades later, using approximately the same images and metaphors, although they are unfamiliar with each other, have always been fascinating in psychoanalysis, psychology, religion and esotericism. You begin to think that our world is an interesting place. Suppose, Castaneda could get acquainted with this, but how did the Indians know the Path of Tao or the ancient Indians - psychoanalysis ... Similar coincidences happen.

In general, the further you go from the normal assembly towards a different version of yourself, the closer you are to the world of the unconscious, which is hidden from you in the normal state. But for some, the assemblage point is mobile (Castaneda's books claim that these are all women because of their common beginning with the universe. Psychoanalysis explains the same from other positions, I have this in the post below), while for someone initially is far from the "man without imagination" position. In short, the assemblage point needs to be shaken, I learned how to do it, the simplest thing is to reach the Place Without Pity, I have become adept at this, hmm. Then - for many months to fix the achieved position in habits, if it is necessary, or learn to move the point, as women do, although the task will be more difficult.

That's all. So simple and long-dreary-routine at the same time. Give less importance to reality, systematically encourage visual fantasies and treat them as real events. Sensual connection helps this best of all - memories are important for feelings, and abstractions are not very important. CHS, although there are no reliable cases of obtaining imagination in an adult form, the book describes that it is almost a trend when the imagination really develops in 30-40 years. There were ordinary images, there was perception. There were fantasies, but visions came.

The idea of ​​heightening the importance of imagination as a way to get it and enhance it in general runs through the whole book as its final thought. A person with weak imagination has an image. But its development gives rise to perception. That is, the ability to feel what is not there, or to see images in space or in reality. Sense smells and tastes. This is a sharp jump, which, nevertheless, is achievable by the method in the paragraph above.

An interesting feature of people with excellent imagination is mentioned - for them things seem to be alive. That is, they will also say out loud, they say, the thing is inanimate, but they perceive the world differently. For them, furniture is not just a chair or a closet, but a downcast chair and a stooped closet. As sung in the Fleur song:

I know things live their lives

When you don't follow them...

And the world behind is moving,

You just have to turn away

Here I digress for a moment

And everything around became different ...

If you have not heard this group, then I can assure you: the girls just have the ultimate imagination.

The topic of music is also mentioned in the book, like me, the author suspects that it kills the ability to imagine images. I am conducting an experiment and then I will write about it in detail, because. the author is just a thought, but I'll check.

A lot of attention is paid to the movement of images. Like, imagination is born from movement. I am ready to believe: I am now able to see any images, except perhaps in perpetual motion. They say that frozen and motionless things are the most difficult to present.

And there was an important thought that I myself did not come to: clarity in complexity, not simplicity. Aspiring to simple and understandable can become a good engineer, but he is a bad dreamer. This desire must be killed in oneself.

The rest of the book contains reasoning and research into the nature of thinking, representation, and fantasy. For example, almost any invention or imagination occurs by analogy, i.e. the baggage of knowledge, works of art and other things affects the ability to become a creative person.

The book just convinced me that there was nothing worthwhile left that I didn't know. Now I know everything about imagination. Nothing to learn, no one knows more. It remains only to work.

IX. Blog and radio

Russian-speaking readers can read the rest of my blog (I especially recommend the block with links on the right of the main page in the PC version of the site), as well as listen to my audio podcasts (radio), there on many topics, but often indirectly related to imagination and perception:

Bonus

Some fun facts about the imagination that I learned in the process of studying.

Most people sees in reality what in everyday life is called hallucinations. Most of these people are women.

You don't see the world. Seriously. Maximum - a small area in front of you, everything else is imagination. The out-of-focus there is such that you can't really see anything outside of this area, except blur. Perhaps moving objects, but another mechanism is responsible for this.

The graphics in games, as they improve, spoil the impressions of the visual part. Blurry textures, fog, poor rendering and detailing force the imagination to complete the picture or give the impression (relevant in aphantasy) that you are looking at the completed picture. The better the graphics, the worse the graphics! Have you ever wondered why indie pixels never go out of style...

For the same reason, the better a person's imagination, the less he appreciates "cool graphics" in movies or games. And even more - emotionality and associations.

People with a good imagination do not achieve anything in life. They have no need - they can represent. Example: tulpa girl. Why bust your ass to make money or achieve social success when you can imagine a girl who is indistinguishable from life? Yes, and with a better character.

Seems or seems only to people with imagination. With aphantasy, I thought it was a figure of speech.

There is only what matters. The rest is not imagined. A person does not see what does not matter to him, in his world it is literally blurry and invisible. Those. if it were possible to take a screenshot of someone's view, there would be blurred unimportant things.

This also explains sense of taste. Things that were previously unimportant acquire meaning. The picture becomes more complete, and now a person is no longer able to look at Khrushchev and dirt. His needs increase, and when the picture is almost completely blurred, it does not matter what is under the blur.

Peripheral vision is entirely a product of the imagination. People see the periphery differently, someone has excellent detail, I don’t have it.

The picture of the artist, made “from the head”, is built according to the principles of graphics of the imagination, i.e. it is a direct contact from the brain of the artist to the brain of the viewer, which is makes artists' graphics more valuable than photography and 3D.