im·ag·i·na·tion

/iˌmajəˈnāSH(ə)n/

noun: imagination; plural noun: imaginations

the faculty or action of forming new ideas, or images or concepts of external objects not present to the senses.

I’ve become fascinated by the eyeball. It is perhaps one of the greatest miracles and mysteries of biology. Scientists think it is quite possible the human eye developed from light sensitive cells in the brain. Light sensitive cells. Of course biologist are talking about actual light provided by photons from our sun, but let’s enter into the world of metaphor for a sec. We are sensitive to the light and in fact seek it out. If we were cats we could make out forms in the dark, but as it is we need the light to to grope our way forward - internally and externally. There are of course multiple ways of seeing. Those who are blind can form the shape of something in the mirror of their minds by touch, by description. So it is really our imagination which helps us SEE.

I’ve participated in projectCURATE for some time, whose aim is “imagining, striving for, and living in a better world wherein justice, mercy, humility, and love are not just aspirations, but assumptions.” Imagine that. Walking together in a world where your freedom to be exactly as you are is assumed, not granted, permitted, or merely tolerated. I keep going back to this analogy: we don’t judge an elephant for doing elephant. But when we see a human not doing human the way we think they should, lord help us.

Last Saturday when we were groping around about the way forward in achieving racial justice, I expressed anxiety about not knowing what to DO. What concrete steps can we take to shift into the light? One of the leaders of Curate, Secunda Joseph, answered by pointing to the importance of imagining and intuiting. This too is part of doing, for if we can’t imagine it, we can’t become it. She talked about those small things we shift when we start by looking within and asking ourselves, “What else could be possible here?”

Imagine how those light sensitive cells catch fire when we step into and trust the possibility for a more beautiful world we want to create. This is where infinity meets possibility, for I am certain that our imaginations provide access to the limitless edges of the universe where anything is doable.