With Earth Day in mind and following last month’s imagination-focused book review, I was keen to keep the theme of imagination going. This lovely book features some hugely thought-provoking ideas and approaches to how we can better use imagination, a uniquely human skill in remaking our societies. Hopkins shows us how we can imagine a better world and make it happen, which I, for one, would love to see as an outcome of our life-changing experiences of COVID-19. If we want to change for the better, there’s some brilliant examples in here that might just help us all.
If you sometimes feel a little bit glum about the world’s problems, this might come as a welcome antidote and one which certainly sparked my imagination. As a taster, Rob introduces the book with an alternative vision of the not-too-far-away future and this approach continues throughout the book. Although we clearly have work to do in improving our imagination muscle (Hopkins describes it as “flaccid and untoned”), it is definitely still very possible.
Through a series of “what If’ chapters, covering play, schools, storytelling and how we ask questions among others, Hopkins shares a host of really enlightening examples that had me shouting out loud in agreement.
Using the question ‘what if’ immediately leads you to think differently. My overriding takeaways from this book were hope and optimism; we have a window of opportunity that can be opened by us flexing our imagination muscle a little more to help shape a better future.