Power of Imagination is More Than Just a Metaphor
[15 April 2009 - ScienceDaily] We've heard it before: "Imagine yourself passing the exam or scoring a goal and it will happen." We may roll our eyes and think that's easier said than done, but in a new study in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, psychologists Christopher Davoli and Richard Abrams from Washington University suggest that the imagination may be more effective than we think in helping us reach our goals. More
posted by Steven Dahlberg @ 9:51 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
Dear Mr. Dahlberg,
I came across your blog while searching for something else and found it quite interesting. I've read quite a few of the posts and agree with much of what you have to say. However, I thought I should mention that the analogy of "aging" and exile is a very problematic one. Anyone who would try to draw such analogy obviously has no experience of exile. Aging is a natural process; if we're blessed with longevity, we inevitably experience advanced age. It is, also, a gradual process that begins at birth; it is a lifelong process. It does not arrive in the middle of the night with soldiers kicking down your door, or in the form of an arrest warrant. It does not necessitate fleeing in nothing but the clothes on your back, and infinitely worrying what will happen to those you leave behind. It does not suddenly cut you off from all that is familiar to you. And though old age--which is the last stage of this lifelong journey--may leave you at the mercy of others, that nonetheless does not happen overnight. In other words, aging is everything that exile is not, and, despite its trials and challenges, even its frustrations, it can be, if we're lucky, a joyful state from where we not only look back with contentment and gratitude for life's blessings, but also gladly embrace new discoveries and marvels. Exile, on the other hand, is never a joyful state. Exile is the cradle of nation precisely because it is not a nation; it is a permanent state of suspense and alienation that only ends with the birth of--or return to--nation. Hence Alexandr Solzhenitsyn's ultranationalism upon return to Russia, a nation from which he was exiled for much of his life, and his pronounced anti-Americanism in spite of the refuge that America provided him amid his troubles. Exile is about escape: but it is not only a place of escape, it is, also, a place from which every exile so desperately seeks to escape with a desperation that is beyond mitigation. Only the most trying circumstance could induce same desperation in normal life, and such circumstance could occur at any stage in life and not necessarily in advanced age.
I can understand the appeal of the notion of exile, but in reality there is no ground to compare it with aging or advanced age. "Exile is strangely compelling to think about", Edward Said wrote in the opening sentence of his essay, Reflections on Exile, "but terrible to experience."
With best wishes,
Olu Oguibe, Connecticut
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