Imagination

*Note: The following text is the output of transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

Bill Berthel:

Welcome to the Get Emergent Podcast. The Get Emergent podcast guides, leaders to creatively strengthen relationships and improve performance of their leadership and those that they lead. We like to provide concepts and ideas that you can turn into pragmatic experiments to help you develop your higher potential in your work and in your leadership. And hopefully you’re going to find some better practices to apply directly to your work. I’m Bill Berthel.

Ralph Simone:

And I’m Ralph Simone.

Bill Berthel:

Ralph, I love the word, the topic for today. Imagination.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah. It’s timely for me. It’s as some of the listeners probably do not know. We pick a word, each of us picks a word for ourselves, for the ear.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

To be intentional about a behavior or a practice. And mine for 2026 is imagination.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

And coincidentally, I didn’t intentionally pick up this book called the Imagination Muscle by Albert Reed. Just started reading it. But I loved how he framed it was before the book even started. It was on a, like a title page. He framed, you know what imagination is, and I’d like to read that if I may to kind of jump start this. But he said, what is the imagination? A swarm of living things. Second, what is the task of the imagination? To stare at things it does not fully understand. What is the miracle of the imagination? Now this one particularly resonated with me. The answer to see what is not already there.

Ralph Simone:

And I was thinking as I move into, let’s call it the final third of my life at 68 years old and I’ve been doing something I’ve loved for an awfully long time. As I move into the final third, I need to start to imagine things that aren’t already there. And so I think the book is timely. But I think the book is timely for any of us that are experiencing change, complexity, uncertainty. Instead of muscling our way through, maybe we ought to consider imagining our way through.

Bill Berthel:

So maybe it was the energy in which you just read that, Ralph. But for me, it went from imagination from being, you know, a thing to being more alive, not objectifying it, but almost personifying it. So when I hear the imagination, it’s not just a simple cognitive function or a chemical experience our brain is having. It’s this spiritual, emotional, living thing, living image that’s happening in the mind’s eye

Ralph Simone:

that we all have and have access to.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

And I think oftentimes, like imagination, similar to creativity, you have it or you don’t. I think that’s ridiculous.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

You are either aware of it or tapped into it or activating it. Or embodying it.

Bill Berthel:

Right.

Ralph Simone:

Or you’re not. But it’s there. Right? It’s, it’s there. And I think, you know, the reason we pick a word is so we are more intentional about activating what’s already there.

Bill Berthel:

Yes.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah. So I got thinking about, you know, in our leadership development coaching and our training, how might we be more imaginative in how we, you know, bring our offerings to life, how we support our clients, but how do we help them activate their imagination in ways that serves them in their lives and in their organizations?

Bill Berthel:

I have a coaching client who does that very well. I don’t know if he would agree that he does it very well, but he brings it up often as a self alignment exercise and he’ll ask himself what the 6 year old version of himself would see in that moment or do in that moment. And it does two things. One, it taps to a time where he knows he was more imaginative. Maybe a little bit more creative. But it also destigmatizes the idea that imagination is just for children or is, you know, not serious because he taps into that as a real tool in his technical work and in his leadership. So he’ll ask himself. It’s almost a self coaching. I’m really stuck here. I Wonder what my 6 year old self would see or do. I love that practice.

Ralph Simone:

I think that’s a great practice. I appreciate you sharing that with our listeners because I think we get way too serious about our stuff, about ourselves, about our actions, about how people will receive us.

Bill Berthel:

So not to interrupt you, but what he often says his six year old self would say is dude, you got to relax.

Ralph Simone:

Like you

Ralph Simone:

can’t. Good, good. But I think there’s a, with the silliness or the lightness, I think that is an environment in which the imagination muscle is developed.

Bill Berthel:

Yes, yes.

Ralph Simone:

And I think we have to first be gracious towards ourselves.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

And to let her hair down a little bit. I mean it reminded me, you know we talk about curiosity which is probably a cousin of imagination. We talk about channeling our inner four year old and I do think, what was interesting, I’ll digress a bit. You know the Christmas holiday was fascinating. and more energetic this year because we, we have, I have a lot of nieces and nephews now that have kids in their kids there anywhere from you know, newborn to three years old. And the imagination, you know, we were there Christmas Eve and my sister is taking her three year old grandson out to leave the reindeer food into and just the, the energy and the curiosity, in the expectation, just put a magic back into a holiday that always has existed. But you know, often we forget that three year old or four year old or six year old time.

Bill Berthel:

Absolutely.

Ralph Simone:

And I want to finish strong, whatever that means. And I think part of finishing strong is remembering how you started.

Bill Berthel:

Oh, interesting. Really interesting.

Ralph Simone:

And getting back to some of those things, I just was writing about things I used to do when I was a kid.

Bill Berthel:

Yes.

Ralph Simone:

In just writing about those things. Yeah. Was energizing.

Bill Berthel:

Sure.

Ralph Simone:

And then I said, well, why aren’t, why aren’t I doing them? Or there are some reasons why I’m not doing some of them. But why couldn’t I do a version of those now and then? What impact would that have on my creativity?

Bill Berthel:

Absolutely.

Ralph Simone:

Ingenuity. so this is why it’s my word for the year. And I think it’s a muscle that is underdeveloped for many people.

Bill Berthel:

So I love that I think analogy that it’s a muscle. Maybe it’s either underdeveloped or maybe we’ve allowed it to atrophy. Right. We were utilizing it and developing it as younger people and hopefully many of our listeners are disagreeing with us right now. They’re saying I actually am very imaginative and Good, because I think we do have, I think we do have many clients and leaders that are incredibly imaginative in their organizations and their leadership. But for those of us that might feel like it’s atrophied or could be recharged, how do we get back into the exercise? I love the process of writing down, remembering and writing down some of the things we used to do.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah, I think that’s a good one

Bill Berthel:

to like exercise that muscle.

Ralph Simone:

I think the self question that your client asks, you know, what would your 6 year old self do? I think is good. I think going back to, you know, some of the hobbies, some of the things you used to do in your younger time and maybe reinitiating those things. I think first is writing about it, but I think secondly then is embodying it, you know, actually participating in it at some level would be really good. What else would you suggest in that area?

Bill Berthel:

I think I had shared a little while ago with you this idea of taking a tour of your own neighborhood with people that you know, one at a time that come from very different either fields or disciplines.

Ralph Simone:

Cool.

Bill Berthel:

So you ask them to just come to your space. It could be your neighborhood, it could be your own home and ask them to describe it to you. You will see things through someone else’s eyes, which is a form of imagination as they share it with you, as they tell the story, as they interpret your space or your neighborhood or, you know, choose what you’re going to, you know, kind of the venue of that. The space and the environment through someone else’s eyes will inform now your imagination.

Ralph Simone:

I love that. I’m thinking of some versions of that. I know when we. My wife and I walked the dog together, and I said, when we’re on 3rd street, you know, what color is that house that we like? And she didn’t know, and it wasn’t to try and jam her up. But the idea is what we miss, what we miss because we’re either so, focused on reality or what’s right in front of us. But just even looking up.

Bill Berthel:

Right.

Ralph Simone:

One of the ways to stoke the imagination muscle is to look up into the sky, into the clouds. Remember when you were a little kid and you used to see all the shapes?

Bill Berthel:

Absolutely.

Ralph Simone:

And I mean, that’s the imagination. Right. That the shape is not really there. Or maybe it is. We actually.

Bill Berthel:

We do that when we go camping with the campfire. That’s the embers are in the very bottom of the fire, similar to the clouds. They can take shapes. You can start to see things. You can imagine a different time where that was our television or that was our primary focus of entertainment. And that’s where we had our conversations

Bill Berthel:

and we shared ideas, we shared our imagination as we looked to the sky with the constellations, making meaning of things in our. Of our environment. Speaking of television, my son likes to mute commercials and imagine he could sell something else with that commercial. Right. So you’re not hearing the messaging. And he’ll turn that commercial into some fun thing he’s trying to sell. All of a sudden, what a great strategy. Imagination.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah.

Bill Berthel:

Exercise and imagination. Like, imagine what else this could be for.

Ralph Simone:

Maybe we got to just suspend that it leads to something. Because I think that is a barrier to activating the imagination 100%. Your son may never sell.

Bill Berthel:

No. Whatever it is, a different thing.

Ralph Simone:

That’s not the point. The point is he’s having some fun with imagining what else that commercial could be for. And I think that’s extremely powerful.

Bill Berthel:

And it’s a purposeful exercise for the mind.

Ralph Simone:

Right.

Bill Berthel:

So we’re not so stuck in the current state or the current reality of things. That way we can be more creative in our work, in our leadership. We can be more innovative in whatever we’re Developing whether we’re an engineer or in a role that is more traditionally quote unquote creative or not, imagination becomes a very strong tool for the leader

Ralph Simone:

you reminded me of with your sons. I love this. I’m going to try it actually.

Bill Berthel:

it’s kind of entertaining.

Ralph Simone:

So it could be any commercial. You just mute it.

Bill Berthel:

So the only ones we don’t are the progressive commercials because we like those so much. But yeah, any commercial.

Ralph Simone:

All right. Well I think those progressive commercials are quite imaginative.

Bill Berthel:

They’re already brilliant. Right?

Ralph Simone:

Yeah. So one of the things and I think part of environment matters in changing environment matters. I think for imagination, putting yourself in a place where you can tap into that imagination muscle. When I’m stuck or when I’m writing about something, I’ll often go into a grocery store with my pen and a notebook or journal and I’m pretty at home in a grocery store. I grew up in a grocery store. It’s my first real job and I like it. I’m energized. I know a lot of people don’t like shopping.

Bill Berthel:

Right.

Ralph Simone:

1. But there’s something about merchandising and laying things out. But it’s unrelated stimuli to what we do as a living. But it triggers the imagination. Descriptions on canned goods can lead to something or how things are packaged. Sure. can start to give us trigger our imagination for how we might package something. Some of our offerings or services. And it just. And I remember walking through a fairly well known grocery store in town and I was dressed for work and I’m taking notes and somebody thinks I’m from headquarters.

Bill Berthel:

You look like an inspector or something. Right.

Ralph Simone:

You look like. They go what are you doing? They go what are you doing?

Bill Berthel:

Right. Right.

Ralph Simone:

I’m looking for ideas for my next blog post. They go what?

Bill Berthel:

You got people nervous or at least you got.

Ralph Simone:

And that was not my intention. So they started imagining things that weren’ the intent. No.

Bill Berthel:

But you know a new or different environment. Right. Can spark imagination. Maybe it’s something similar to being inspired by our environment. It’s seeing what’s not there yet.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah.

Bill Berthel:

Is what imagination is. It’s having a vision of something that’s not there yet. It may be through a beautiful story like your. I think it was your sister’s 3 year old grandson who has heard the story of the reindeer. So he’s going to go out and feed them.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah.

Bill Berthel:

But he can probably see those reindeer.

Ralph Simone:

he’s imagining them landing and eating

Bill Berthel:

the corn or whatever he’s putting out there for Absolutely right. They’re not there yet, but they’re in his mind.

Ralph Simone:

And I think what we’ve been talking about are a lot of ways to activate that imagination. And I think, you know, having it as a word, I think will activate it. But looking for those opportunities, another activity I used to do, and I think I’m going to resurrect it was called the change of state. And when I was physically at my desk with perhaps not a great opportunity to leave it because of deadlines or workload, I would take like these 8 1/2 by 11 atlases. You’d have the United States on one side and you’d have the map of the world on the other side.

Bill Berthel:

Right.

Ralph Simone:

And I would use my imagination, this exercise. I would close my eyes and I could have. Didn’t matter what side was up, and I would point, and wherever I landed, I would imagine what it would be like to be there.

Bill Berthel:

That’s awesome.

Ralph Simone:

And, usually I used it when I was either bored or stuck. And sometimes, perhaps I stayed there too long. But it was an interesting way to activate the imagination muscle.

Bill Berthel:

Absolutely.

Ralph Simone:

To stay creative with whatever task at hand I was working on and to just re. Energize myself. And, you know, maybe I used. I strayed from that because in school I used to be caught daydreaming, which I think is another. Yeah, yeah. Pretty good use of the imagination. I mean, I’m being bored with something I’m not interested in, or I could imagine being somewhere else.

Bill Berthel:

Well, I think you would agree that the coaching we do with leaders is asking them to imagine a different state of something, being something else, doing something else, achieving something else. I mean, being coached is an exercise in using your imagination.

Ralph Simone:

And it’s interesting. And this is why I think this is so important to proactively cultivate. It’s interesting when you ask somebody, well, what else could it look like? Early on in the coaching, they say, well, it couldn’t look like anything else. Well, what if it could? What would it look like? So we’re really trying to dust the cobwebs off of that dormant muscle.

Bill Berthel:

Yes, yes. So perhaps when we can’t quite see it differently, it’s an opportunity to maybe an indicator of that imagination muscle being a little atrophied. But it’s an opportunity to lean into maybe one of these exercises, even though it might seem as distracting as imagining you’re in a different state, something will emerge, something will spark, something will connect, and you’ll have perhaps a different direction or a different idea. To move your work forward can be very pragmatic. As fun and as disconnected as it sounds, can actually really come back to a grounded result.

Ralph Simone:

I think so. I think so. And I mean, I’m coming back to the question I think I’m going to work in, you know, what would your 6 year old self tell you to do? Yeah. Or what would your 6 year old self be willing to do? Or imagine. And even if you allow yourself to go there just momentarily, that creates the opening.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah, yeah. Mine would probably say get the Legos out and play. Be a little bit more playful.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah. I used to have the Legos. And then what was the UK’s version of Legos? Bristle blocks.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah, Bristle blocks. Those were great.

Ralph Simone:

I remember we used to lot of lean manufacturing simulations with bristle blocks.

Bill Berthel:

But yes.

Ralph Simone:

When my kids were young and they’d go down to my office in the house, what they noticed and commented on was all the toys I had. Now that’s interesting. Right. So what are we doing with those toys, those bristle blocks, those Legos and these simulations? We’re really teaching some lean manufacturing, but we’re tapping into the imagination. We’re bringing people back to a time when they played with things they thought. My job was fun. It is. And it was fun because we had a lot of opportunity to work with people in a more imaginative state.

Bill Berthel:

You just made a connection for me. I didn’t realize. It’s why I love toy stores and bookstores in the same way the toy store automatically calls for my play. Maybe a more physical way. The bookstore calls for my mind to play.

Bill Berthel:

And both are about imagination. They’re very similar for me.

Ralph Simone:

Interesting.

Bill Berthel:

But it’s like how so? You know, you use the grocery store, I might use the library, I might use a toy store, I might use a. Maybe your thing is, As you love knitting, go to the yarn shop wherever you’re sparked.

Ralph Simone:

One of the reasons that I don’t do a lot of online shopping is for the very reason you just pointed out. The bookstore does a similar thing for me. In fact, Toy stories are not as easily found.

Bill Berthel:

They’re not.

Ralph Simone:

You can find.

Bill Berthel:

We have one in our town. But yes, they’re not.

Ralph Simone:

You can find a department, Right?

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

Has toys in it. So. But you can still do it. But I think.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah.

Ralph Simone:

And I like the looking, I like the imaginative, I like the kinesthetic part of that.

Bill Berthel:

Yes.

Ralph Simone:

As well. To pick up the book, to pick up the toy, to play around with it. I, I just was, I Almost bought for myself for Christmas. one of those old electric football games, you know, that vibrated.

Bill Berthel:

Giant buzzboard one.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, and then I was thinking about. It was always hard to throw the ball and But the game that we used to play in the neighborhood, I. And I would, if I could get an adult league in this. The hockey. The tabletop hockey.

Bill Berthel:

Yes.

Ralph Simone:

With the puck and the guys, they used to be just two dimensional, now they’re three dimensional.

Bill Berthel:

Yes.

Ralph Simone:

And we got so good. We actually had to drill new holes to make the nets wider so you could, you know. But any. You would imagine what team you were from the NHL, and what player you were. And it was so much fun. I mean, I still love to play foosball. For that reason. I still like to play pool.

Bill Berthel:

Yes.

Ralph Simone:

These are things that I did when I was younger

Ralph Simone:

and really just to do them. And, you know, I got pretty good at some. But it was about playing, it was about imagining. It was about being was a guy. Minnesota Fats was a famous pool player. But it was, it was, that was the imagination activated.

Bill Berthel:

So another way to exercise that imagination muscle is through play.

Ralph Simone:

Absolutely.

Bill Berthel:

Yeah. Choose something you might enjoy or revisit that involves some element of play.

Ralph Simone:

Yeah.

Bill Berthel:

Spark the imagination. Nice.

Ralph Simone:

I think hopefully we’ve stoked the imagination or the curiosity around the imagination muscle. But find some things that, speak to your, your inner six year old, your younger self, and be more playful. And even if it’s not an activity that you used to do, bring more of that playful and imaginative energy to what you currently do. I think that could be fun as well.

Bill Berthel:

I love it. And folks, we’d love to hear from you. Thanks for listening. whatever you’re doing to stoke more of that imagination in your work and your leadership, let us know. You can reach right out to [email protected] or to me, [email protected] you can listen to a new podcast two times every month here at Get Emergent or wherever you listen to your podcasts. We hope you enjoyed this episode. Thank you,