Imagination Part 1: The Magic If
[This article is part of a series about how to craft an intentional life using ideas and tools from Constantin Stanislavski’s acting system for working on our inner motive forces. Previous article: Concentration of Attention]
Imagination is our ability to visualise or conceptualise an object or scenario that is not in front of us and that we may not have experienced before. Imagination is key for an actor to be able to embody a character and make their experiences believable in a play. In the same way, it is also key to setting goals in life and achieving them. To develop the will to see the journey through and deal with inevitable obstacles, we must be able to imagine what the desired changes look and feel like, how they will affect our current life, and visualise how the path of work and perseverance will get us there.
Stanislavski described three different types of truth: actual fact, which is reality and truth as we generally understand it (although even this idea is not simple, as objective truth is difficult to pin down); make-believe, which is fantasy without logic or coherence; and scenic truth. Scenic truth is actual fact that has been adapted to imagined circumstances. Great actors create scenic truth on stage, rather than make-believe, by transforming their own real experiences so they correspond to ideas and experiences in the script. Through their imagination, they transform their personal actual facts into usable scenic truths. Just as actors do, we can distil our previous experiences and observations, thoughts and memories, and apply them to our goal conditions. If we do this with attention to detail and identify with the person (our future selves) who can achieve the goal, then we can plot a course to get there.
“If acts as a lever to lift us out of the world of actuality into the realm of imagination…This word has a peculiar quality, a kind of power which you sensed, and which produced in you an instantaneous, inner stimulus…
Imagination is our ability to visualise or conceptualise an object or scenario that is not in front of us and that we may not have experienced before. Imagination is key for an actor to be able to embody a character and make their experiences believable in a play. In the same way, it is also key to setting goals in life and achieving them. To develop the will to see the journey through and deal with inevitable obstacles, we must be able to imagine what the desired changes look and feel like, how they will affect our current life, and visualise how the path of work and perseverance will get us there.
Stanislavski described three different types of truth: actual fact, which is reality and truth as we generally understand it (although even this idea is not simple, as objective truth is difficult to pin down); make-believe, which is fantasy without logic or coherence; and scenic truth. Scenic truth is actual fact that has been adapted to imagined circumstances. Great actors create scenic truth on stage, rather than make-believe, by transforming their own real experiences so they correspond to ideas and experiences in the script. Through their imagination, they transform their personal actual facts into usable scenic truths. Just as actors do, we can distil our previous experiences and observations, thoughts and memories, and apply them to our goal conditions. If we do this with attention to detail and identify with the person (our future selves) who can achieve the goal, then we can plot a course to get there.
Magic If
Stanislavski’s exercises on imagination delve into how to stimulate and encourage positive creative thought by playing with and harnessing our imagination. The main tool that he conceptualised to enable this is the Magic If. Using this concept helps to create a bridge between where we are now and where we want to be. Stanislavski describes its use in the following passage. In this scenario, the actors are in a sitting room. The director has asked them to enact what they would do if a madman was trying to enter the room, whereupon the actors have all rushed to the door to prevent entry.“If acts as a lever to lift us out of the world of actuality into the realm of imagination…This word has a peculiar quality, a kind of power which you sensed, and which produced in you an instantaneous, inner stimulus…
The supposition of danger is always exciting. It is a kind of yeast that will ferment at any time. As for the door and the fireplace, inanimate objects, they excite us only when they are bound up with something else, of more importance to us. Take into consideration also that this inner stimulus was brought about without force, and without deception. I did not tell you that there was a madman behind the door. On the contrary, by using the word if I frankly recognised the fact that I was offering you only a supposition. All I wanted to accomplish was to make you say what you would have done if the supposition about the madman was a real fact, leaving you to feel what anybody in the given circumstances must feel.” (Constantin Stanislavski, An Actor Prepares)
The Magic If is a powerful tool to spur imaginative thinking. The word If helps us to think about what we would do in a particular set of circumstances if something were to change. It helps us to empathise with others by imagining what we would do in their circumstances.
If is a non-coercive tool: it doesn’t ask you to believe blindly; it just asks you to consider possibilities here and now. It connects your actual circumstances with your imagination and appeals to your sense of action. What would I do here, today, now if…
In the following quote, Stanislavski describes the power of the Magic If. Although he does this in terms of an actor expressing a part on stage, I believe the Magic If can similarly be used to help us achieve life goals. I have indicated how this passage could be read for that purpose in square brackets within the quote.
“The circumstances which are predicted on ‘If’ are taken from sources near to your own feelings, and they have a powerful influence on inner life…Once you have established this contact between your life and your part [your goal state], you will find that inner push or stimulus. Add a whole series of contingencies based on your own experience in life, and you will see how easy it will be for you sincerely to believe in the possibility of what you are called upon to do on the stage [to accomplish to reach that goal state]. Work out the entire role in this fashion, and you will create a whole new life…
The Magic If is a powerful tool to spur imaginative thinking. The word If helps us to think about what we would do in a particular set of circumstances if something were to change. It helps us to empathise with others by imagining what we would do in their circumstances.
If is a non-coercive tool: it doesn’t ask you to believe blindly; it just asks you to consider possibilities here and now. It connects your actual circumstances with your imagination and appeals to your sense of action. What would I do here, today, now if…
In the following quote, Stanislavski describes the power of the Magic If. Although he does this in terms of an actor expressing a part on stage, I believe the Magic If can similarly be used to help us achieve life goals. I have indicated how this passage could be read for that purpose in square brackets within the quote.
“The circumstances which are predicted on ‘If’ are taken from sources near to your own feelings, and they have a powerful influence on inner life…Once you have established this contact between your life and your part [your goal state], you will find that inner push or stimulus. Add a whole series of contingencies based on your own experience in life, and you will see how easy it will be for you sincerely to believe in the possibility of what you are called upon to do on the stage [to accomplish to reach that goal state]. Work out the entire role in this fashion, and you will create a whole new life…
We may conclude from this that If is also a stimulus to the creative subconscious. Besides, it helps us to carry out another fundamental principle of our art: ‘unconscious creativeness through conscious technique’.” (Ibid)
Stanislavski often speaks about using techniques that have been consciously developed to stimulate and promote unconscious creativity. This is the idea that underpins his system. It is also an idea that underpins this series of articles: choosing life goals, crafting the path to get there, and following that path requires creativity and discipline. The practices and ways of thinking described here prime us for creative thought and foster determination to act intentionally towards desired goals. The Magic If is one of the best of these tools.
The following are a couple of simple exercises that you can use to begin to play with the Magic If as a spur to your imagination.
“What are you drinking? I am drinking tea. But if it were castor oil, then how would you drink it? I am forced to recall the taste of castor oil, to show her the disgust I feel.
Where are you sitting? On a chair. But if you were sitting on a hot stove, then what would you do? I am obliged to think myself on a hot stove, and decide how I can save myself from being burned.” (Ibid)
As Stanislavski shows in the extract above, start playing with the Magic If to exercise your imagination. When doing simple actions or using everyday objects, change a single detail and imagine how this changes things for you. Focus on the physical ways you react to the changed circumstances or objects. For example:
“Suppose the surroundings, the teacher, the students, remain as they are. Now with my Magic If I shall put myself on the plane of make-believe, by changing one circumstance only: the hour of the day. I shall say, it is not three o’clock in the afternoon, but three o’clock in the night. Use your imagination to justify a lesson that lasts so late.
Out of that simple circumstance there follows a whole series of consequences. At home your family will be anxious about you. As there is no telephone you cannot notify them. Another student will fail to appear at a party where he is expected. A third lives in the outskirts and has no idea how he will get home, the trains having stopped. All this brings external changes and inner ones as well, and gives a tone to what you do.
Or try another angle. The time of day remains at three in the afternoon, but suppose the time of year has changed. Instead of winter it is spring, the air is wonderful, and it is hot out even in the shade.” (Ibid)
Inspired by the quote above, choose a familiar situation in which you find yourself. For example:
These exercises show how we can use our imagination to affect our circumstances. We cannot remove those circumstances, but we can change how we perceive them. In fact, we must use our circumstances and the objects around us as fodder for our imaginary lives. We can use ordinary objects as outlines of anything we want to create - this will spur our feelings and help us develop the will to turn imagination into reality. These exercises help us to think creatively about our circumstances and the objects around us.
This is easier to manage on stage, where the end point of an actor’s work is the action of the play. In real life, there is no well-defined endpoint. We must choose to act with imagination and intention, or we will simply be reacting to circumstances and the will of other people. Our imagination, properly channelled, can fuel our desire to get up and do something active.
We need discipline to achieve things in life. Even work that we love at times requires doing tedious chores and dull tasks. How you use your imagination and place your attention can make tedious tasks more interesting along the way. Engage your imagination in the whole process: conceptualising the end goal; understanding where you are now; and working to get from one to the other.
If work is invested with imagination, then it can become a pleasurable psycho-physical experience. Use the Magic If to play with ideas and turn dull tasks into games and adventures. For example, what if online research to find necessary information is a hunt to uncover a treasure map, where each new idea adds a piece to the map? What if exercising to stay fit becomes exploring an underground cave, running away from zombies, or winning an endurance race?
You are only limited here by what you can imagine. Think about what you are doing and what else the actions could symbolise. Or stay away from fantasy and make a game of working towards your goal. Give yourself deadlines and rewards for finishing difficult tasks. Your attention will be switched from the demanding specifics of what you are doing to the challenges of your chosen journey.
“The more an actor has observed and known, the greater his experience, his accumulation of live impressions and memories, the more subtly will he think and feel, and the broader, more varied, and substantial will be the life of his imagination…” (Constantin Stanislavski, Creating a Role)
Our imaginations are often triggered by sensory experiences or lead to imaginary sensory experiences. For example, thinking about your grandmother, you can almost smell her baked cookies; or eating freshly baked bread, you think of your favourite bakery back home.
Revisit the exercise on Curating your mood in Emotion Memory Part 2 to explore the link between the senses and imagination. This exercise invites you to create various sensory experiences and reflect on how they make you feel and what you remember. This time, focus on what the sensory experiences conjure in your imagination.
When we imagine, deliberately involving all of our senses enriches the imagined world and makes it more believable. Once you have a spark, ask yourself some questions to elaborate and extend the imagined scene:
The decisions we make in each moment of our lives are based on our memories of what has gone before and our imaginings of what may happen in the future. Emotion memory and imagination work together continuously to shape our current decisions, by connecting our past and future.
As with any powerful tool, however, imagination can lead us in the opposite direction. We can easily become trapped and paralysed by imagining negative consequences and unlucky events, or we can become mired in a delicious fantasy that doesn’t go anywhere in reality. As with our emotions and emotion memory, we need to train ourselves to focus on positive imagination that can uplift us rather than drag us down. We also need to train ourselves to connect our imaginings to possible actions.
This chapter introduced the Magic If, and showed how playing with our imagination can encourage and sustain us, as we work towards our desired goals.
When we can step into a creative space, we can use the Magic If to conceptualise a goal state that we want to reach, then find the appropriate actions arising from the Magic If, and our path or through line of actions to the goal. Imaginative attention to goals and tasks will help us to fine-tune our objectives; find ways to make them more enticing and truthful to us, which will lure us towards accomplishing them.
It can, however, be very difficult to use your imagination at a whim. The next chapter, Imagination Part 2: Prompts shares ideas and prompts from Stanislavski to encourage and develop the imagination.
Stanislavski often speaks about using techniques that have been consciously developed to stimulate and promote unconscious creativity. This is the idea that underpins his system. It is also an idea that underpins this series of articles: choosing life goals, crafting the path to get there, and following that path requires creativity and discipline. The practices and ways of thinking described here prime us for creative thought and foster determination to act intentionally towards desired goals. The Magic If is one of the best of these tools.
The following are a couple of simple exercises that you can use to begin to play with the Magic If as a spur to your imagination.
Exercise: Changing a detail
Stanislavski described a simple imaginative game he played with his niece to illustrate the power of If.“What are you drinking? I am drinking tea. But if it were castor oil, then how would you drink it? I am forced to recall the taste of castor oil, to show her the disgust I feel.
Where are you sitting? On a chair. But if you were sitting on a hot stove, then what would you do? I am obliged to think myself on a hot stove, and decide how I can save myself from being burned.” (Ibid)
As Stanislavski shows in the extract above, start playing with the Magic If to exercise your imagination. When doing simple actions or using everyday objects, change a single detail and imagine how this changes things for you. Focus on the physical ways you react to the changed circumstances or objects. For example:
- Picking up a book or mug, what if it were a spider…an iceblock…a treasure…a gun
- Lying in bed, what if it were a bed of nails…a bed of clouds…a mud pit?
- Catching a ball, what if it were a heavy stone…a slime ball…a delicate web?
Exercise: Changing a circumstance
This exercise forms a pair with the one above. In this case, Stanislavski describes an exercise to change one circumstance that has a sequence of knock-on effects.“Suppose the surroundings, the teacher, the students, remain as they are. Now with my Magic If I shall put myself on the plane of make-believe, by changing one circumstance only: the hour of the day. I shall say, it is not three o’clock in the afternoon, but three o’clock in the night. Use your imagination to justify a lesson that lasts so late.
Out of that simple circumstance there follows a whole series of consequences. At home your family will be anxious about you. As there is no telephone you cannot notify them. Another student will fail to appear at a party where he is expected. A third lives in the outskirts and has no idea how he will get home, the trains having stopped. All this brings external changes and inner ones as well, and gives a tone to what you do.
Or try another angle. The time of day remains at three in the afternoon, but suppose the time of year has changed. Instead of winter it is spring, the air is wonderful, and it is hot out even in the shade.” (Ibid)
Inspired by the quote above, choose a familiar situation in which you find yourself. For example:
- At work, doing everyday tasks or in a meeting
- At home in the morning
- At the gym
- In the park with friends or alone
These exercises show how we can use our imagination to affect our circumstances. We cannot remove those circumstances, but we can change how we perceive them. In fact, we must use our circumstances and the objects around us as fodder for our imaginary lives. We can use ordinary objects as outlines of anything we want to create - this will spur our feelings and help us develop the will to turn imagination into reality. These exercises help us to think creatively about our circumstances and the objects around us.
The Magic If and discipline
Imagination for Stanislavski is intimately connected with action; it must have an active component, otherwise, it is self-indulgent. All the work that you do intellectually and emotionally towards visualising your goal state and how to get there should be transformed into actions and interactions with other people, objects and the environment.This is easier to manage on stage, where the end point of an actor’s work is the action of the play. In real life, there is no well-defined endpoint. We must choose to act with imagination and intention, or we will simply be reacting to circumstances and the will of other people. Our imagination, properly channelled, can fuel our desire to get up and do something active.
We need discipline to achieve things in life. Even work that we love at times requires doing tedious chores and dull tasks. How you use your imagination and place your attention can make tedious tasks more interesting along the way. Engage your imagination in the whole process: conceptualising the end goal; understanding where you are now; and working to get from one to the other.
If work is invested with imagination, then it can become a pleasurable psycho-physical experience. Use the Magic If to play with ideas and turn dull tasks into games and adventures. For example, what if online research to find necessary information is a hunt to uncover a treasure map, where each new idea adds a piece to the map? What if exercising to stay fit becomes exploring an underground cave, running away from zombies, or winning an endurance race?
You are only limited here by what you can imagine. Think about what you are doing and what else the actions could symbolise. Or stay away from fantasy and make a game of working towards your goal. Give yourself deadlines and rewards for finishing difficult tasks. Your attention will be switched from the demanding specifics of what you are doing to the challenges of your chosen journey.
Observation and the senses
Imagination is stimulated and fed by observation. The more we have observed and experienced, the more we will be able to use the Magic If to imagine possibilities in our lives. To repeat a quote from the chapter on Observation:“The more an actor has observed and known, the greater his experience, his accumulation of live impressions and memories, the more subtly will he think and feel, and the broader, more varied, and substantial will be the life of his imagination…” (Constantin Stanislavski, Creating a Role)
Our imaginations are often triggered by sensory experiences or lead to imaginary sensory experiences. For example, thinking about your grandmother, you can almost smell her baked cookies; or eating freshly baked bread, you think of your favourite bakery back home.
Revisit the exercise on Curating your mood in Emotion Memory Part 2 to explore the link between the senses and imagination. This exercise invites you to create various sensory experiences and reflect on how they make you feel and what you remember. This time, focus on what the sensory experiences conjure in your imagination.
When we imagine, deliberately involving all of our senses enriches the imagined world and makes it more believable. Once you have a spark, ask yourself some questions to elaborate and extend the imagined scene:
- Who or what is the subject? (this could be you)
- Where are they in time and place?
- What do they see, hear, smell, touch, and taste?
- Why are they here?
- What are they doing and why?
Exercise: Observation and imagination
This exercise is similar to the observation exercise in Tempo & Rhythm Part 1. However, it focuses on how imagined actions can be developed from observation, rather than observing and understanding reality.- Spend time in a public space where you can observe people, for example, sit in a restaurant or bar, a shop, a park, or a bus stop, or walk down a busy street.
- Choose someone to watch for a while. What are they wearing? What are they doing? What is their body language?
- Are they alone or with someone? If they are with someone, what is that person’s appearance and body language?
- Think about what might be happening here:
- Imagine the details of why they are here, where they have come from and are going to, and what they are doing. If they are with someone, imagine what their relationship is, and what this moment means to that relationship.
- Now what if you were them, in their position? Thinking about all of their actions, what reasons can you imagine to justify the actions?
- In both parts of (4) make sure that you base your imaginings on observed details and your self-knowledge, rather than unlikely fantasy.
What is the point?
Imagination is a tool of the intellect. More than any of the other intellect tools, it influences our emotions and our will. An active imagination can elevate us out of the most dreary and difficult circumstances. It can also propel us to action and to improving our lot.The decisions we make in each moment of our lives are based on our memories of what has gone before and our imaginings of what may happen in the future. Emotion memory and imagination work together continuously to shape our current decisions, by connecting our past and future.
As with any powerful tool, however, imagination can lead us in the opposite direction. We can easily become trapped and paralysed by imagining negative consequences and unlucky events, or we can become mired in a delicious fantasy that doesn’t go anywhere in reality. As with our emotions and emotion memory, we need to train ourselves to focus on positive imagination that can uplift us rather than drag us down. We also need to train ourselves to connect our imaginings to possible actions.
This chapter introduced the Magic If, and showed how playing with our imagination can encourage and sustain us, as we work towards our desired goals.
When we can step into a creative space, we can use the Magic If to conceptualise a goal state that we want to reach, then find the appropriate actions arising from the Magic If, and our path or through line of actions to the goal. Imaginative attention to goals and tasks will help us to fine-tune our objectives; find ways to make them more enticing and truthful to us, which will lure us towards accomplishing them.
It can, however, be very difficult to use your imagination at a whim. The next chapter, Imagination Part 2: Prompts shares ideas and prompts from Stanislavski to encourage and develop the imagination.
Comments
Post a Comment