Who says it’s only the adult creative types who bear an intrinsic talent of imagination? All those visualizers and advertising stalwarts scattered all over, or all those emphatic design engineers- it isn’t just this breed which stretch their minds beyond limits to live in a world full of imaginative frames, trying to give concrete shape and meaning to abstract ideas. The entire “imagination” and ‘abstract thinking’ talent mushrooms and grows over a period of many years. Needless to mention then, that this seed of ‘divergent thinking’ is sown in their mind and hearts as kids.

Children have fantastic imagination. Imagination is as though their buddy and they simply love to float in the mystical cloud of abstract thinking.

The last thing on any parents’ mind should be to clip or curb their imaginative thoughts by unnecessarily fencing their thought with logical reasoning. When it comes to imagination, sky is the limit, and parents need to understand this very element.

Just the other day, my friend’s daughter excitedly went over to her and told her- “mom, you know, what honey bee gives us?” Her mommy replied “Yes, dear, it gives Honey. Now, obviously this wasn’t the actual question that the kid had for her mom. She smiled at the reply, and further continued asking “Do you know what a butterfly gives us?’. Now my friend was quiet. She knew butterflies don’t give anything. But she simply replied to her daughter- “You tell me, my dear, what a butterfly gives us”. Very confidently, with an intonation of “I know it all, the six year old remarked “It gives us butter!”. Now, here’s the catch. My friend knew this wasn’t the right answer from the point of view of logical thinking. In fact, this wasn’t in any way the correct answer. But she consciously reworded her next sentence to something like this- “Your imagination is really vow”. Any other ‘reasoning’ oriented and practical mom in her place might have immediately shunned the child’s reply and said “no, this is wrong. Who fed this wrong information in your head? A butterfly doesn’t give butter at all.” At this very minute, with this point blank reply that mother would put an end to the imaginative thoughts racing in her kid’s mind. And this would pave way for the imaginary doors to become one by one shut for that child.  I later acknowledged my friend whose reply was apt. She applauded her daughter’s imaginative thinking by giving the kind of reply she gave.

My other friend’s five year old child was busy watering their plants on their terrace one lazy Sunday morning, when suddenly out of nowhere a bumble bee raced into their balcony. The child was startled. From one corner, he observed the way the bee was flying around. He then dashed indoors and told his mom “Vow mommy, look at our plants. They are having so many beautiful and pretty flowers on them. That way, even the flowers in the balcony of that aunty living one floor above us, are quite colorful. But you know what? This one bumble bee was sitting on those flowers, and from up above, it saw our flowers. And then as soon as it saw our flowers, it raced downstairs from her balcony to ours, only to sit onto our flowers. It loved our colorful flowers so much”. What a story! I consider it to be a wonderful concoction, and an incredible narration of some vivid imagination that five year old is having in his magnificently wired brain.

When I asked my friend how she reacted to her son’s story, she said ‘I was quietly and attentively listening’. There and there I realized that one more creative and imaginative brain is being nurtured well. One of the most beautiful experiences parents can truly indulge in is to listen well- to listen attentively to the stories and narrations that their kids are unfolding in front of them. And the last thing on any parents’ mind is to cut them short and to ask them to keep quiet or keep it short. It instantly puts a complete full stop to their imaginary ideas, which are only going to take shape if they are being given a good ear.

Imagination in children could be toying along with words like the six year old did when she mentioned about honey bee making honey, and drawing a parallel to a butterfly making butter! She obviously knew that cow gives milk and butter. But that moment while conversing with her mom, she wanted to wander in the clouds of imagination; and her mom let her wander, with the way she replied to her statement. She didn’t pull her down, neither she did she try to correct her directly.

Imagination in children could also be cooking up nice stories and narrating them in their unique styles and tones.

Paying good attention and acknowledging their imaginary attempts is like giving rise to one new creative head on the face of this planet, which is otherwise full of “overtly practical”, no-nonsense, point blank” speaking and thinking beings all around us.

If convergent thinking has its own takers, let even divergent thinking has its own fair share. Let the creative juices flow in children today, so that tomorrow, the world would become a slightly more interesting place to live; with all these creative thinkers dabbling with newer ideas or path breaking innovations.

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