89 Quotes About How Imagination Gives You Wings

These imagination quotes will inspire you to unleash the untapped treasures in your mind.

There are countless stories about the power of imagination.

Authors, artists, and inventors are just a few who can attest to the importance of imagination in their work.

Every person has a unique set of experiences and perspectives, and imagination is all about combining them in unique ways.

What can imagination bring to your life?

There are untapped treasures in each person’s mind, including yours.

When you unleash your imagination, you can create something unique that adds to your work, studies, artistic endeavors, athletic prowess, relationships, and hobbies.

The imagination quotes below can help you understand your relationship with imagination and how it can give you a boost in your life.

Don’t forget to also check out these creativity quotes about expressing your real self.

Check out our most popular quote article, a list of short inspirational quotes for daily inspiration. 

Explore our complete collection of motivational quotes here.

Quotes About Imagination and Reality

1. “I had a monumental idea this morning, but I didn’t like it.” – Samuel Goldwyn

You will also enjoy our article on creative hobbies.

2. “Imagination should be used, not to escape reality, but to create it.” – Colin Wilson

3. “You need imagination in order to imagine a future that doesn’t exist.” – Azar Nafisi

4. “Imagination creates reality.” – Richard Wagner

5. “Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality.” – Lewis Carroll (see more Lewis Carroll quotes)

6. “Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.” – Mark Twain

7. “Everything you can imagine is real.” – Pablo Picasso

8. “Reality is for people that lack imagination.” – Hayao Miyazaki

9. “We are more often frightened than hurt, and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.” – Seneca

10. “Reality leaves a lot to the imagination.” – John Lennon

11. “What is now proved was once only imagined.” – William Blake

If you’re enjoying these quotes, you’ll love our collection of William Blake quotes for the creative soul.

12. “The power of imagination created the illusion that my vision went much farther than the naked eye could actually see.” – Nelson Mandela

Imagination Quotes About Creativity

13. “If you do not express your own original ideas, if you do not listen to your own being, you will have betrayed yourself.” – Rollo May

14. “You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” – Mark Twain

15.  ”A pile of rocks ceases to be a rock when somebody contemplates it with the idea of a cathedral in mind.” – Antoine St. Exupery

16. “When one paints an ideal, one does not need to limit one’s imagination.” – Ellen Key

17. “The best use of imagination is creativity.” – Deepak Chopra

18. “Imagination is more important that knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.” – Albert Einstein

19. “Laughter is timeless, imagination has no age and dreams are forever.” – Walt Disney

20. “Imagination is the beginning of creation. You imagine what you desire, you will what you imagine, and at last, you create what you will.” – George Bernard Shaw

21. “I begin with an idea and then it becomes something else.” – Pablo Picasso

Also check out these drawing quotes and sayings to speak to the artist in you.

Quotes About Imagination and its Role in Life

22. “Live out of your imagination, not your history.” – Stephen R. Covey

23. “True change takes place in the imagination.” – Thomas Moore

24. “Your imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.” – Albert Einstein

25. “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams, and live the life you have imagined.” – Henry David Thoreau

26. “Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere.” – Carl Sagan

27. “But, I nearly forgot you must close your eyes, otherwise…you won’t see anything.” – Lewis Carroll

28. “Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination.” – Oscar Wilde

29. “Expand your imagination.” – Jeff Hardy

30. “The world is but a canvas to the imagination.” – Henry David Thoreau

31. “When you start to develop your powers of empathy and imagination, the whole world opens up to you.” – Susan Sarandon

32. “Worry is a misuse of imagination.” – Dan Zadra

33. “Imagination is an instrument of survival.” – Rogier Van Der Heide

If you enjoy this article, check out our collection of unicorn quotes to spark your imagination.

Imagination Quotes About Happiness

34. “Limitations live only in our minds. But if we use our imaginations, our possibilities become limitless.” – Jamie Paolinetti

35. “Imagination is a place where all the important answers live.” – Joe Meno

36. “I have too much imagination to be a housewife.” – Marilyn Monroe

37. “The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas and throw the bad ones away.” – Linus Pauling

38. “It is the essence of genius to make use of the simplest ideas.” – Charles Peguy

39. “The only limit to your impact is your imagination and commitment.” – Tony Robbins

40. “The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.” – Albert Einstein

41. “If you can imagine it, you can achieve it. If you can dream it, you can become it.” – William Arthur Ward

42. “All achievements, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea.” – Napoleon Hill

43. “Imagination is the power of the mind over the possibilities of things.” – William Stevens

44. “The man who has no imagination has no wings.” – Muhammad Ali

If you’re enjoying these quotes, make sure to read our collection of Muhammad Ali quotes on life, love and being a champion.

45. “Imagination is the true magic carpet.” – Norman Vincent Peale

46. “Imagination takes you everywhere.” – Anonymous

47. “Happiness is not an ideal of reason, but of imagination.” – Immanuel Kant

Quotes About Imagination and Ideas

48. “No idea is so outlandish that it should not be considered.” – Winston Churchill

49. “There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time has come.” – Victor Hugo

50. “An idea is salvation by imagination.” – Frank Lloyd Wright

51. “Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.” – John Steinbeck

52. “A new idea is delicate. It can be killed by a sneer or a yawn; it can be stabbed to death by a quip and worried to death by a frown on the right man’s brow.” – Ovid

53. “Bring ideas in and entertain them royally, for one of them may be the king.” – Mark Van Doren

54. “Ideas won’t keep. Something must be done about them.” – Alfred North Whitehead

55. “Everyone is in love with their own ideas.” – Carl Jung

56. “An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.” – Oscar Wilde

57. “An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little before it will explain itself.” – Charles Dickens

58. “Nearly every man who develops an idea works it up to the point where it looks impossible, and then he gets discouraged. That’s not the place to become discouraged.” – Thomas Edison

59. “Nothing is more dangerous than an idea when it is the only one you have.” – Emile Chartier

60. “Imagination is like a muscle. I found out that the more I wrote, the bigger it got.” – Philip José Farmer

If you enjoy this article, check out our collection of wonder quotes for those who crave inspiration & imagination.

More imagination quotes and sayings

61. Imagination does not become great until human beings, given the courage and the strength, use it to create.” – Maria Montessori

62. “Imagination is the golden-eyed monster that never sleeps. It must be fed; it cannot be ignored.” – Patricia A. McKillip

63. “Because when you are imagining, you might as well imagine something worthwhile.” – Lucy Maud Montgomery

64. The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.” – Jean-Jacques Rousseau

65. When you become the image of your own imagination, it’s the most powerful thing you could ever do.” – RuPaul

66. “The imagination is the goal of history. I see culture as an effort to literally realize our collective dreams.” – Terence McKenna

67. Perhaps imagination is only intelligence having fun.” – George Scialabba

68. “The soul without imagination is what an observatory would be without a telescope.” – Henry Ward Beecher

69. “In the world of imagination, all things belong.” – Richard Hugo

Imagination quotes that are filled with wisdom

70. “Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one.” ― Terry Pratchett

71. “My imagination functions much better when I don’t have to speak to people.” ― Patricia Highsmith

72. “Our imagination flies — we are its shadow on the earth.” ― Vladimir Nabokov

73. “My imagination will get me a passport to hell one day.” ― John Steinbeck

74. “Reason is intelligence taking exercise. Imagination is intelligence with an erection.” ― Victor Hugo

75. “Without leaps of imagination or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all is a form of planning.” ― Gloria Steinem

76. “My imagination makes me human and makes me a fool; it gives me all the world and exiles me from it.” ― Ursula K. Le Guin

77. “Imagination governs the world.” ― Napoleon Bonaparte

78. “It’s strange how dreams get under your skin and give your heart a test for what’s real and what’s imaginary.” ― Jason Mraz

79. “It’s delightful when your imaginations come true, isn’t it?” ― L.M. Montgomery

Imagination Quotes That You Can Relate To

80. “In that way, imagination and intelligence enter into our existence in the part of servants of the primary instincts.” ― Albert Einstein

81. “The imagination is the golden pathway to everywhere.” ― Terence McKenna

82. “Imagination is the voice of daring. If there is anything godlike about God, it is that. He dared to imagine everything!” ― Henry Miller

83. Imagination, producing new metaphors or revivifying old, is not the cause of truth, but its condition.” ― C. S. Lewis

84. “It is the divine attribute of the imagination, that it is irrepressible, unconfinable; that when the real world is shut out, it can create a world for itself…” ― Washington Irving

85. “I doubt that the imagination can be suppressed. If you truly eradicated it in a child, he would grow up to be an eggplant.” ― Ursula K. Le Guin

86. While the world of reality has its limits, the world of your imagination is without boundaries.” ― Wayne Dyer

87. “To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle requires creative imagination and marks real advances in science.” ― Albert Einstein

88. “Our imagination is the only limit to what we can hope to have in the future.” ― Charles Kettering

89. “Imagination and fiction make up more than three-quarters of our real life.” ― Simone Weil

Which of these imagination quotes resonated with you best?

Maybe you need a breakthrough in your creativity, research, or writing.

Maybe you need a boost or a new approach to something else you are working on.

Whatever it is, imagination can take you beyond the limits of reality and help you find a workaround.

You can create something never seen before.

If nothing else, you can enjoy a little entertainment by allowing imagination to take over!

Trust in your imagination, and it won’t lead you astray.

Countless others before you have found success and happiness by exploring the real power of imagination, and you can be the next to make a great discovery there.

Which of these imagination quotes and sayings resonated with you best?

Do you have any other favorite quotes to add?

Let us know in the comment section below.