COACHING THE COACHES,
PART 15
by Jon Rappoport
Copyright © 2011 by Jon Rappoport
In our society, there is a rite of passage into adulthood. It’s quite simple.
A young person decides on a course of action that will considerably diminish his imagination.
It doesn’t matter what particular career path is chosen. The basic feature is: it requires “much less imagination.”
Every day, thousands of youngsters undergo this rite.
Years later, they wonder what happened.
But they don’t really think it’s in their best interests to remember what happened; because if they did, they would reawaken the most fundamental core of their consciousness, and they would probably abandon the careers they’ve so carefully crafted.
No, it’s better to forget and keep forgetting.
But now they’re experiencing problems, and they feel they need help, and they come to you, the coach.
That’s the situation.
So are you going to try to tinker with and fix “what’s wrong?”
Is that your mission in life?
“Hi. I’m the tinkerer. I’m here to adjust the lights and check the on-board computer.”
If so, how is that going?
The dynamic of the situation is obvious. The elephant in the room is not being addressed. On some level, the client realizes it. When he’s fed up, he goes elsewhere.
But again, we come back to the paradox. He wants to recover his imagination. But he doesn’t want to. He’d dedicated to living without imagination. But he realizes that’s what’s missing from his life. It doesn’t matter that this push-pull is operating at a subconscious level. It’s operating.
What are you going to do?
I’ve faced this question many times. I’ve tried all sorts of approaches. In the end, I realized why I was really doing the work: to reawaken imagination. That’s why I was there. The choice, then, became clear.
Fortunately, I had vast experience in the area of changing my own life, and that experience had to do with writing and painting. I had seen what happened when I began living through and by imagination. The mists cleared and the questions dissolved. The doubts faded. The energy came back and the thrill expanded. The future opened up.
So the notion of working with another person to wake up his imagination wasn’t just a shot in the dark. It made complete sense. It was a radical step, but it made sense.
Take that as a clue. What are doing with your imagination? How important is it to you?
Some of the greatest developments of the past 200 years have been based on organization, systems, and technology. Put together, they’re a formidable force. However, in the process, something has been lost, misplaced. And people feel that loss. They may not be able to pinpoint its nature, but they sense it.
A person looks out at the world and says, “Look at all the technology. Look at all the organization and the systems. In my life, am I going to fit myself into that nexus, or am I going to go with my imagination?”
What a no-brainer. In conventional terms, the person picks the winner. He joins the team. He enlists in the system.
And then he induces a layer of amnesia about his own creative power.
He’s surrendered something vital.
He’s made a “this or that” configuration, and he chose.
Now, as the coach, it’s your job, should you decide to accept it, to undo that.
Your odds of success may seem long. It might appear you’re trying to swim up a waterfall. But you see, if you think that way, that’s YOUR rationalization. That’s the story you tell YOURSELF.
Actually, we’re living in a vast sea of imagination, and we’re surrounded by products and outcomes of imagination. And the idea of relinquishing imagination is, from that point of view, preposterous.
But you have to know that. You have to know it in your bones.
If you do, your work becomes a fascinating challenge.
We live in a world that abounds in paradoxes: “I want this but I don’t want this. Things I really want tend to slip away. Things I don’t really want come to me. I’m in the right system, but the system doesn’t give me what I really need. I’m good at planning, but what I plan for doesn’t work out. I try hard. Maybe I need to try less.”
This wall of static is transcended and neutralized, to an astonishing degree, by graduating into a realm where IMAGINATION and CREATING are the motive forces, the modes of transportation.
Jon Rappoport
A former candidate for a US Congressional seat in California, Jon has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years. He has written articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. The author of The Ownership of All Life, Jon has maintained a consulting practice for the past 15 years. He has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, and creativity to audiences around the world.