In a meeting in late December 2006, the President of a small university asked me what course I wanted to teach in their Ph.D. Psychology program. Instead of responding with the curricula that I was already prepared to teach, to my surprise I found myself blurting out… “metaphor.” The topic was right there; there was [ Read more … ]
martin foss
Working the Soil: Social Change and Metaphor
Don’t look for me in a human shape. I am inside your looking. No need for form with a love this strong. The lines above from Rumi can be interpreted in more than one way. As I teach courses on the psychology of metaphor, to my mind, Rumi’s lines refer to the power that metaphors [ Read more … ]
Making Friends with Your Imagination
Imagination is indirect, nonlinear, and fuzzy. It’s more about taking you to a “new place” and providing a fresh perspective than providing a numerically clear solution or quick fix. Further, when we open up our imaginations, we challenge traditional norms. Our creative process comes up with ideas that are often at odds with standard procedures. [ Read more … ]
Love is Destructive
It has been said that love does not want to destroy, but to preserve. Quietistic love has been praised, [yet]…mere passivity is surely no true love. The process of love is a creative drive, a force which, in spite of its tranquility of the present, lives a life of active realization. I’ve often told the [ Read more … ]
Communicating with an Inexhaustible Power….
Creativity is all about relationship. When we create something new, we are making a connection with our self and our inner voice (of course). We’re also connecting with whatever is inspiring us at the moment–the subject we are studying, the tree we are painting, and so on. But there is another connection as well–when we [ Read more … ]