One way we can enliven the imagination is to push it toward the

“One way we can enliven the imagination is to push it toward the illogical. We’re not scientists. We don’t always have to make the logical, reasonable leap.” Thus spoke Stella Adler, the great teacher of actors, the prophetess of the stage who believed that the soul of art is not found in reason, but in imagination — that wild, untamed current which carries the heart beyond what the mind can measure. In her words, we hear a summons — a call to those who create, to those who dream, to those who live not by formulas but by vision. She reminds us that the artist’s task is not to explain the world, but to reimagine it — not to trace the footsteps of logic, but to wander boldly into the forest of wonder.

Adler’s teaching arose from her deep devotion to truth in acting, but not the kind of truth that can be proven or dissected. For her, truth was not found in the logical but in the emotional, the spiritual, the intuitive. She saw that the modern world, in its worship of reason and precision, had grown cautious — afraid of the irrational, the impossible, the unexplainable. Yet it is precisely in those realms that imagination is born. When she urged her students to “push toward the illogical,” she was not asking them to abandon thought, but to transcend it — to venture beyond the mind’s fences into the boundless fields of creation.

For artists, as Adler taught, must dare to dwell in mystery. A scientist seeks to understand what is; an artist seeks to reveal what might be. The logical leap builds bridges of knowledge, but the illogical leap builds wings of vision. It is the illogical that births originality, that breathes life into characters, music, and poetry. The greatest works of art are rarely reasonable — they are luminous, defiant, alive with contradictions. Hamlet’s madness, Picasso’s fractured faces, Rumi’s whirling ecstasy — all are born from the illogical fire that logic alone could never spark.

Consider Albert Einstein, the scientist whose mind, paradoxically, was also poetic. When asked how he made his discoveries, he replied, “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” Even in science, where reason reigns, it is imagination that first dares to leap where facts have not yet formed. The theory of relativity, the vision of curved space and time, was itself a product of the illogical dreamer within the scientist. Einstein imagined himself riding upon a beam of light, and from that impossible vision, a new universe emerged. Adler’s words echo this truth — that all progress, whether in art or thought, begins when the mind dares to step beyond reason.

In the realm of acting, Adler’s call to the illogical was revolutionary. She rejected the mechanical approach of mere imitation and demanded that her students live truthfully within imagination. To embody a character, one must not only analyze, but feel, believe, dream. The actor must find in themselves something that cannot be explained — that mysterious connection between self and story that makes performance sacred. Through the illogical, the actor touches something eternal — the pulse of humanity that no script alone can convey.

But this lesson reaches beyond the theater. It belongs to every soul who would live fully and creatively. Our modern lives, bound by reason and routine, grow dry when we deny the illogical — when we silence the dreamer, the child, the fool within. To “enliven the imagination” is to restore wonder to the heart. It means daring to see magic in the ordinary, to believe in what has no proof, to take risks that defy explanation. For it is only in stepping beyond logic that we rediscover freedom — the freedom to love without fear, to create without boundaries, to live as though the impossible were possible.

So take this teaching to heart, O seeker of truth: do not be a prisoner of logic. Let reason guide you, but let imagination lead you. When the path seems clear, turn aside into the unknown; when the world demands answers, offer beauty instead. Allow the illogical to whisper in your ear, and follow where it leads. For as Stella Adler teaches, life itself is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be experienced — and it is the imagination, not the intellect, that gives that mystery its light.

Thus, remember this truth: logic builds the house, but imagination makes it a home. Logic draws the map, but imagination discovers the stars. If you would live deeply, if you would create boldly, then let your spirit stretch beyond the reasonable — for it is there, in the wild, illogical realms of vision, that the eternal fires of creation burn.