IMAGINATION ~ DREAMING ~ CREATIVITY ~ ESCAPISM ~ Dungeon Seekers Prompt – Dreaming Big

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david walliams, Dr. Seuss, dreaming, dreaming big, dungeon seekers, escaping reality, escapism, George S. Patton, imagination, Maya Angelou, peter pan, pixiecold, roleplay, second life, spike millighan, thoughts, vampires

Dungeon Prompts – Season 2, Week 10: Dreaming Big

This week’s prompt is:   Dreaming Big  (running from March 6 – March 12)

“You can’t use up creativity.  The more you use, the more you have.”

–Maya Angelou

“If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn’t thinking.”

– George S. Patton

“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life’s realities.“

– Dr. Seuss

Suggested Prompts:

*This week’s Prompt is about imagination.  Just forget about all of your limitations this week and tell us about something new.  It could be as simple as your dream job, or as elaborate as that story you’ve been waiting to tell.  Sing us the song that you’re living to one day sing, or describe the far off lands you are dying to get to.  This week let us unleash our imaginations from our normal restraints and dream big!

IMAGINATION ~ DREAMING ~ CREATIVITY ~ ESCAPISM

“I believe in the power of the imagination to remake the world, to release the truth within us, to hold back the night, to transcend death, to charm motorways, to ingratiate ourselves with birds, to enlist the confidences of madmen.”
― J.G. Ballard
(picture by pixiecold)

I guess for me all the above words link together.  When I dream I am using my imagination, creating something that ultimately is a bit of escapism, but it’s not just dreaming is it when we use our imagination and run wild!?  Some of us indulge in this probably more than others.

I have always enjoyed my own company and I NEVER get bored, it’s odd I often wonder what it is like to be bored and wouldn’t mind ‘being bored’ for a few minutes, I am sure I should hate it but nonetheless it would be ‘educational’ to experience it don’t you think?

If I were to be put in an empty room it would be interesting to see compared to others who would get bored first.  The one to get least bored I would anticipate is the person that can use their imagination the best or switch off, or be dog tired and just fall asleep LOL!

“The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease for ever to be able to do it.”
― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan
(picture by pixiecold)

On a serious note, my every day life consists of using my imagination through no choice of my own it seems.  I am one of those people who has about 20 thoughts/ideas/pictures going on in my head at any one time and sometimes, yes it drives me nuts and I would like a rest, wouldn’t you?

So as you can imagine, sitting on a bus my mind might wander and suddenly whilst looking at the little old lady sat with her companion I get imaginary picture flashes of her life, my imagination of her life of course, I am not pretending to be psychic here.  Or I might see something outside the window, a bird doing something odd or at least I think it’s odd and make a story out of it, do you do this kind of thing?

My children often ask me to ‘make’ up a story instead of reading one.  Sometime I comply, and often enough they become a bit wild, a bit crazy and ‘off the wall’ as some people might say.  I often wonder if I should write children’s story books, but I think they would be more like Spike Millighans books or David Walliams but with a slightly loopy loo readability about it.  I just love their dry, ironic, slightly crazy sense of humour, to me it’s colourful, without parameters, gives scope for room in ones imagination whilst listening to build on what they are saying or what picture they are building up.

Quotes ~ as usual, I am a quote fiend, I would like to include some that have sprung to mind!

“Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one.”
―     Terry Pratchett

“I believe that imagination is stronger than knowledge. That myth is more potent than history. That dreams are more powerful than facts. That hope always triumphs over experience. That laughter is the only cure for grief. And I believe that love is stronger than death.”
―     Robert Fulghum,     All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten: Uncommon Thoughts On Common Things    

“Imagination does not become great until human beings, given the courage and the strength, use it to create.”
―     Maria Montessori

“Imagination is the golden-eyed monster that never sleeps.  It must be fed; it cannot be ignored.”
―     Patricia A. McKillip

Great fun these quotes don’t you think?

“Do the children who prefer books set in the real, ordinary, workaday world ever read as obsessively as those who would much rather be transported into other worlds entirely?”
― Laura Miller, The Magician’s Book: A Skeptic’s Adventures in Narnia
(photos by pixicold)

I think also people can learn to utilize their imagination through a forced environment in order to escape something, escapism  The power of the brain to leave one’s body somewhere but take one’s mind and with this sometimes the senses is an amazing thing, it is a coping mechanism as well as something outstandingly amazing given to us to use as it arises.

A confession

I used to be a little bit of what one might call a ‘gamer’.  I discovered an online game called ‘Second Life’  I was introduced to this as my mother was ill.  I think initially I used it as a switching off mechanism, shutting myself off for a while until I had to deal with reality.

Gaming can be very addictive, any kind.

However with this kind of game, it is I feel quite dangerous, because it offers you as it says “your second life” and many many people spend more time on it than their ‘first life’.  I have heard terrible stories of neglect of children etc through people getting tangled up in the buzz and escapism that it can provide.

Why is it so alluring?

Let me give you an example, and I don’t insinuate the person I am about to talk about next was addicted, however you can see the powerful lure he would have felt from the game…. I continue…

You have an avatar when you join.  With this avatar you can name it, dress, go shopping, dance, do a whole host of things, movements, aka animations, sit on poseballs, activate scripts that can pretty much get you to move and interact physically with other people as you would do in real life and more, ie you can fly if you want, or jump over mountains etc.

You can make your avatar look like whatever you want, whatever colour, beautiful, ugly, tall etc, or you could be an animal a fantasy figure.  Oddly enough nearly all females are of course blonde (why?), tall, big busted to the point of ridiculous with pouty lips. I being the kind of person I am of course at times decided to do the opposite and I don’t think I was ever blonde!

You talk via text, some people voice, but usually your first port of call is via text.

You can go shopping, clubbing, bars etc as in real life.

But there are also roleplay sims (honestly I am not advertising here), so with these roleplay sims you go and be yet another person ie Spartacus  on the Capua sim, or a vampire etc etc.

I met this man, on a vampire sim, we got talking, he told me he also roleplayed being a warrior, he had a bevvy of women around him, all beautiful and falling at his feet. He told me that he liked being a vampire because he could fly.  He liked being a warrior because he could run and go in to battle and be a hero.

He then told me that he was disabled, could not use his legs at all and was pretty  much house bound and that his real life love life was certainly not a mirror of what it was on sl!

So this is a simplistic example, but a true one, you can see the lure, you can see the drive to use your imagination and become something else….

Nope I am not going to tell you what I used to roleplay, but I did it for far too long!

(if you want to see more of the stunning pictures by pixiecold, please click here)

So, have any of you roleplayed, did you find it hard to stop?  What are your experiences, please come share 🙂

Let’s keep connected!

Sreejit has reminded me through his comments there is also a scary side to ones imaginations, we have spoken about this below in comments.  Do you have an over active imagination at times that gives you fears?