Living with Imagination and Optimism

Imagine having the courage to think and act more authentically, letting go of expectations. Imagine living each day your dream life and with a clear purpose. Imagine becoming the most influential leader because of your compassion and ethics. Imagine that your seemingly wild ideas are instrumental to addressing climate disasters. This is possible if you dare to imagine it.

Imagination is human’s superpower for individual and collective well-being, problem-solving, and change. Everyone can imagine; it can be fun, freeing, and hopeful, as it allows to see beyond current limitations to create unseen realities, whether personally or globally. Optimistic imaginings can increase positive emotions, boost well-being, and lead to empowerment, fostering constructive change and impactful action.

However, imagination is still mostly associated with children and artists, but unrelated to everyday adult life. As a result, our imagination has become constrained and underdeveloped. While we spend most of our time thinking about the future, our tendency is to imagine apocalyptic scenarios – e.g., worse pandemics – or negative situations rooted in current trends – e.g., AI takes over humanity. We struggle to imagine positive paths forward and often look at others for validation – that is, we follow the familiar and conventional, even if this path does not make us happy. This creates a vicious cycle of pervasive pessimism and hopelessness about the future that increases our insecurities and feelings of anxiety and loneliness and hinders our imaginative powers.

The good news is that imagination can be reclaimed, strengthened, and harnessed.

Sitting at the intersection of psychology, neuroscience, and well-being, this course is an invitation to explore the symbiotic connection between imagination and well-being, as well as to discover what is getting in between us and reaching our potential. In addition to inner development gains, reinforcing human skills — listening, imagining, conversing, empathizing, paying attention, collaborating — will better equip learners to succeed as employees are increasingly looking for these skills in candidates.

Through a blend of mindfulness-based practices and reflection, experiential exercises (visualization, role-play, futuring, pretend play, sensory engagement), and hands-on creativity activities (drawing, sketching, collaging) learners will journey inwards, slow down, identify their barriers, and experience the transformative benefits of imagination for mental and physical health. In each session, learners will practice tools and skills to unlock their barriers and deliberately tap into their imagination as well as to integrate and foster imagination skills in their life, their community, and their work.

By the end of the course, learners will feel a sense of freedom, courage, compassion, and optimism. They will walk away with the inspiration and confidence to live with imagination – and to nurture it in others.

• Educators, policy makers, leaders
• Healthcare professionals, therapists, healers
• Practitioners of any discipline
• Anyone willing to journey inwards, think in different ways, and challenge their beliefs and worldviews – as well as dream, wonder, and play!