Your Creative Power

Ten years ago, the editor of a leading magazine invited me to lunch. I had been one of his contributors, but we had never met. He broke the ice by asking, "e;What is your hobby, Mr. Osborn?"e;"e;Imagination,"e; I replied. He paused, then wrote on the back of an envelope, "e;MY HOBBY IS IMAGINATION."e;"e;Mr. Osborn,"e; he said, "e;you must do a book on that. It's a job that has been waiting to be done all these years. There is no subject of greater importance. You must give it the time and energy and thoroughness it deserves."e; That remark started this book. Although I earned my master's degree in practical psychology and have devoted most of my life to the psychology of advertising, I cannot claim to be a psychologist. Nor have I tried to write as a psychologist. I have felt free to take figurative liberties with academic concepts. For instance, I realize that imagination is an integral part of man's mind-body function; and yet, for the sake of clarity and readability, I refer to imagination as if it were an entity of itself. My frequent use of the term "e;brainstorm"e; may bother the reader at first. Although Chapter 33 will fully explain, an inkling of its meaning may be helpful here: "e;Brainstorm"e; is used mainly to label the kind of conference where a few people sit down together for an hour or so solely to use their creative imaginations-solely to suggest ideas on a specific subject, right then and there. During the past ten years, in quest of material and insight, I have interviewed hundreds of people and have read hundreds of books, speeches and articles. I am indebted to all who talked with me and to all whose writings I read. Many of their names will be found in the index.