I was walking through the park when I saw a mother and daughter playing together. They were playing ‘bus drivers’, and the mother asked,
“Where do you want to go?”
Her daughter replied, eyes sparkling,
“Wherever the unicorns are!”
It reminded me of a quote by William Blake “What is now known was once only imagined.”
It all begins with imagination.
Imagining what is possible. Imagining the thing you want most. And believing it could one day become reality.
“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.”
— Henry D. Thoreau, Walden.
As adults, our instinctive ability to imagine, to create, to stay curious can soften under the weight of responsibility and the complexities of adult life. And as Lucy Colgan asks: does creativity become a luxury — or is it a necessity?
In my view, it is a necessity.
Creativity and curiosity come from our willingness to play, to get messy, to be imperfect, to dream and imagine. When we allow ourselves into this mindset, ideas begin to fizz and flow — a rainbow of possibility.
As neuroscientist, Anne-Laure Le Cunff, writes in Tiny Experiments:
“When you lean into your curiosity, uncertainty can be a state of expanded possibility — a space for metamorphosis. It’s a way to turn challenges into triggers for self-discovery, and doubt into a source of opportunity.”
As we emerge into a new year, I can already feel the urgency and overwhelm creeping in. I recognise my own habits of jumping to self-doubt and comparison.
Yet, as I am learning, we are not all in the same place — and we are not meant to be. We are each in our own season of life, and the more we allow ourselves to be there, without judgement, the more room we create for curiosity.
So instead of letting comparison or self-doubt take the lead, perhaps this is an invitation to pause — and get curious.
To ask yourself:
- What season of life am I in right now?
- What habits need reinforcing — or adapting — so I can meet myself where I am?
- What choice could I make today that would support me, rather than overwhelm me?
Because imagination doesn’t ask us to leap ahead. Curiosity doesn’t demand certainty.
They simply ask us to begin — exactly where we are — and stay open to where the path might lead.
