Albert was a thoughtful guy.
He said several things that caught my attention.
One was "Some things that can be counted don't count and some things that can't be counted count most".
That little word riddle always stuck with me, and I've tripped over its truth more than once.
But of all the things he said my favorite was "Imagination is more important than knowledge".
For years and years I commiserated I didn't have enough knowledge under my hat. I wasn't smart enough, I wasn't knowledgeable enough, I didn't know things. I spent a lot of time needlessly worrying about this. Maybe you have too.
I just wasn't enough. Period.
That is until I reached my 50s. Then I found out how much LESS I knew than when I was 40!
I was going the wrong direction—forward in age, backward in knowledge attained relative to the growing amount yet to learn.
Then, one day I ran into Gene Tippmann.
Gene is an inventor. He has a very inventive mind. It seemed at age 72, Gene hadn't lost a bit of his knowledge. He was still drinking from the wellspring of inspiration. I was envious but intrigued. Initially my same old worn out tapes began to play in my mind—"man, this guy sure knows a lot and I sure know so little" they began.
But he told me a story that allowed me to re-frame, and gain new appreciation for my true abilities rather than my lack.
Heres the story:
A man was walking with a friend in Central park. As they were walking the man bent down and picked up a four leaf clover from next to the sidewalk, "look at this, a four leaf clover"! he exclaimed.
They walked a bit more. The man veered from the path a short few steps and picked up another 4 leaf clover and handed it to his surprised friend. In an hour, the man had picked up over 30 four leaf clovers, and was still finding them.
At the end of their time together, the friend before parting stated curiously "what is the chance a person could find 40 four leaf clovers on a single walk in Central Park? How'd you DO that? You must have great eyes."
"No" said the man, "I can barely find the ketchup in the refrigerator. Just ask my wife"
"Then what's the secret, the friend asked?
Two things:
I look for them (most people don't).
Then, I imagine and believe unquestioningly I am going to find one."
The story may not strike you as it did me. I kept thinking about the point of the story —that we have 4 leaf clovers under our very feet all the time—we need only to just look for them. And by creative imagination we can seemingly conjure 4 leaf clovers out of the thin air.
After thinking deeply about this story I saw I had been overestimating the importance of knowledge—something there's never enough of—and ignoring what I had in spades all along.
Imagination.
I could see also that once my imagination is creatively engaged with a specific and emotionally charged thought, knowledge comes to a me unbidden, from nowhere, and knowledge of others automatically is available in just the right admixture to my own necessary to the task. We need not have all the knowledge ourselves to accomplish our desired goal. Unlike the man in central park, this realization was also right under my feet but I was not looking for it.
Notice the word imagination has the word "image" in it. When we can picture what we want, or what's intended, and image it very specifically in our mind's eye, a mysterious thing starts to happen. The alchemy of the universe is at our disposal, and the knowledge that we have, as well as knowledge of others, marches to our imagination's orders as our sub conscious goes to work bringing into existence what we've imagined. This power we have has been told by writers as diverse as Napolean Hill, Wallace D. Wattlles, James Allen, and Shakti Gawain—all thinkers about thinking.
Look around. Everything that you can see started with an image in someone's mind. A thought must precede an action for a physical thing coming into existence.
Socrates had it right when he said--"the soul never thinks without a picture"—and I would add that though thoughts can be words as well—such as an affirmation—the most powerful means to bring life to an idea is by picturing it.
As it resolves and gains more focus and granularity, the very energy of your thoughts impinge on the fabric of matter, which is just another form of energy, and conforms it to the image conceived in thought.
Albert knew this and by applying it gave birth to some of the grandest ideas ever conceived by a single human—indeed he unlocked the deepest secrets of nature.
Of course now you know I am talking about Albert Einstein.
Albert said that imagination is more important than knowledge. He once imagined an elevator in space traveling at the speed of light . From that image he derived the special theory of relativity. He imagined a man holding a lightbulb on a train and how that would look different to the man on the train than a person observing the lightbulb as the train passed by.
That gave birth to the General Theory of Relativity and when it was proved 15 years later by the measurement light of stars warped by gravity visible during a solar eclipse, Alberts fame soared. Such is the power of thought and imagination.
Fortunately, you don't have to be Einstein to utilize this creative power. You are in fact creating with it every day, a birthright of being a human. Every thing that happens to you, good and not so good is generated by your thinking and in particular your mental imagining. If you image lack you receive it—as I did. if you image much you also receive that. This is not mystical speculation but fact.
The next time you are walking, instead of looking for 4 leaf clovers, imagine what you want to give birth to in the next 2 years. Commit it to word and picture. Write it down and if you can't sketch it, find something on the web that reminds you of the image it conjures for you in your head, and firmly plant this image mentally in imaginative soil. Pull this image out on a once a week basis and think upon it for 30 minutes—see it happening and all things associated with it—color, smell, feelings.
Then watch what happens as the universe lines up behind the vision you hold and it starts to happen. You only then need to take action as new inspiration alerts you to do.
I have experienced this many times firsthand. It started with the artwork I created when I was a child. I envisioned it first and completely in my head, then got better in bringing it about on the paper in reality as I got more practiced at the process. People thought my skill was blossoming and it was. But what was really happening was that my imagination was getting better. I was thinking my creations into existence. Eventually I got so good at it that what I could do on the paper matched 90% of what was in my head. This works on paper but a little secret is it also works in the physical world.
You do not need great knowledge. You need great thinking with soaring imagination. Then you and Albert will be kindred spirits.
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