The Three Levels of Your Imagination
Newsletter 006
From the S••L editors:
Dear Writer,
As we all begin to winter in our respective homes and everyday realities, I hope you might bear this question in mind: How aware of your own imagination are you?
Since developing Switch-Lit, we’ve evolved our own understanding of imagination from a fuzzy and wondrous concept introduced in childhood to a clearly defined and practical power without any loss in wonder (quite the opposite). One of the first assurances of this, and of the promise of Switch-Lit, was a serendipitous article by The New York Times columnist David Brooks, “The Awesome Importance of Imagination”, in which I see three “levels” of imagination worth one’s awareness:
Level 1: Pattern recognition
“Imagination is the capacity to make associations among all these bits of information and to synthesize them into patterns and concepts… This prosaic form of pattern recognition can be very practical, but it often doesn’t see the subjective way people coat the world with values and emotions and aspirations.”
Level 2: Other perspectives
“A person who feeds his or her imagination with a fuller repertoire of thoughts and experiences has the ability not only to see reality more richly but also — even more rare — to imagine the world through the imaginations of others.”
Level 3: Enchanted bridges
“The most enchanted form of imagination, which as Mark Vernon writes in Aeon, ‘bridges the subjective and objective, and perceives the interior vitality of the world as well as its interconnecting exteriors.’ This is van Gogh painting starry nights and Einstein imagining himself riding alongside a light beam.”
How do you improve your imagination as the infinite muscle? “By creating complex and varied lenses through which to see the world,” Brooks suggests generally before giving the curious example of novelist Zadie Smith, who would imagine what it was like to grow up in the homes of her childhood friends.
“I rarely entered a friend’s home without wondering what it might be like to never leave. That is, what it would be like to be Polish or Ghanaian or Irish or Bengali, to be richer or poorer, to say these prayers or hold those politics. I was an equal-opportunity voyeur. I wanted to know what it was like to be everybody. Above all, I wondered what it would be like to believe the sorts of things I didn’t believe.”
– Zadie Smith
Now imagine stepping outside of your childhood friend’s home. You look for another lens, complex and varied still, and suddenly feel compelled to start running…
We’re excited to announce the launch of our monthly Story Prompts Contest that invites you to submit your story prompts for our next month’s theme: “Running”
What new literary worlds and daring social adventures can you spark to life for other Switch-Lit writers? Click the link below to submit your prompts and we will notify a winner by January 28th, 2024. The winning prompt and its writer will be featured for the entire month of February 2024 on Switch-Lit’s website, Substack, and Instagram.
We look forward to imagining our world through your imaginative story prompts.
Kenneth Chu
Executive Editor, Switch-Lit
Featured S••L prompt:
Prompt 5
Welcome to the Cocoon Motel. Enjoy your stay.
by Switch-Lit
Did you know?
The practice of cultivating silkworms for their cocoon silk is called sericulture. According to Chinese tradition, sericulture is believed to have originated in China around 2700 BCE. The Empress Leizu is credited with discovering silk production when a silkworm cocoon fell into her tea, unraveling to reveal silk threads.
Silkworms spin a cocoon with a single strand of silk up to 10 city blocks long.
Silk is one of nature’s strongest fibers. The thread is thinner than a human hair, but for its weight, it’s five times stronger than steel.
“The Divine Insect” is a benevolent Asian deity depicted as a silk moth that was known to perform miracles and expel demons of plague in human society.
Don’t give up.
When the four corners of this cocoon collide
You'll slip through the cracks hopin' that you'll survive
Gather your wit, take a deep look inside
Are you really who they idolize?
To Pimp a Butterfly
(full lyrics on Genius)
– Kendrick Lamar
Contact us:
📟 Ping us with any questions, requests, or proposals for Switch-Lit:
editors@switch-lit.com