Moving Forward: The power of Positive Imagination

I came across an amazing distinction between  hopefulness and hopelessness in preparing for my parsha class this week. The source was a video on Shlach by Rabbi David Fohrman, which basically suggests that when we use our  creative imagination to create wonderful and exciting scenarios  about our future, we generate hopefulness, but when we use our power of imagination to look backwards, we will probably land up in a state of hopelessness.

The source for this idea concerns the manner in which the Jewish people responded to being told by the majority of the spies who had gone ahead of the community to scout out the land of Israel, that they felt the whole idea of entering the land of Israel  and dealing with the communities already there was a terrible  idea. In fact they even say, "in our eyes we seemed like grasshoppers, and so we were in their eyes"(13:33), referring to the "giants" that inhabited the land . Their self perception was so negative they even projected it upon how they were seen by others. How did they know how they were seen?  Two righteous spies vehemently disagreed with them, but could not persuade the people that trusting in G-d and moving forward was a valid option. Rabbi Fohrman draws our attention to how backward thinking intensified when the Jews thought  about the challenges that awaited  them in the future.The verses illustrate this in three steps.....1) if only we had died in Egypt, 2) Is it not better for us to return to Egypt? 3) Let us appoint a leader and return to Egypt! (14:1-4)

Didn't  the Jewish people remember all the suffering they endured back in Egypt? Even if these complaints and suggestions  were spurred on by the "Erav Rav"(the mixed multitude who joined the Jewish people on their  exit) surely they too were aware the Egypt experience was not a bed of roses for the Jewish people? How could they suggest going back?? What faculty of being could get a people who had suffered for over 400 years in a certain situation to possibly think that  returning to the source of their suffering would be a preferable situation than trying out their luck and moving forward? Backward facing imagination!

Rabbi Fohrman suggests this is the epitome of hopelessness... engaging our imagination to glorify the past. When we use our imagination to glorify the past, we can edit out the bad parts, we can recreate reality in our minds to make it seem that everything about the path not taken was in fact perfect... we can airbrush what had led us to reject that option and only focus on all the imaginary benefits that path could have offered, and then collapse into negative and hopeless feelings.  The rejected choice is a past that is no longer ours, a choice not made or a path not taken; it could be a house not bought , a shidduch not pursued or a business opportunity overlooked.... when we look back and use our vivid imaginations to extrapolate  all the positives of what might have been, all the wonderful and marvelous realities that could have been ours, we do ourselves a great disservice...We would do better to utilize our creative imagination and power of visualization, which are powerful tools, in forward and thus positive thinking!

To utilize our imagination and capacity for  positive visualization  in forward and thus "hopeful" thinking, we need to ground ourselves  in the new reality of what is now, be focused on the present and the future and then be creative to explore all the possibilities that still exist beckoning ahead, this will lead to hopefulness and not hopelessness! Forward thinking, with positive scenarios imagined and visualized will enable us to feel empowered to take on even the most daunting tasks, making the most of that new job, new home, new shidduch opportunity or even a victory fighting giants!

Shabat Shalom!