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Who sees the meaning of the flower uprooted in the ploughed field? The ploughman who does not look beyond its boundaries and does not raise his eyes from the ground ? No - but the poet who sees that field in its relations with the universe, and looks oftener to the sky than on the ground. Only the dreamer shall understand realities, though, in truth, his dreaming must not be out of proportion to his waking!

Margaret Fuller#27

CreativityBalanceDreamsImaginationRealityPoetry

About this quote

What does it mean?
Only a poet or dreamer can see a flower's broader meaning, but dreaming must stay grounded.
In plain terms
Poets see deeper meaning, but must stay realistic.
What can you take from it?
Balance imagination with reality.

Where it applies

  • creative work
  • problem solving

Putting it to work

  • using metaphor
  • grounding ideas

Questions to consider

  • How do you keep imagination useful?
  • When should you ground your ideas?

Another view

Excessive dreaming can detach from practical action.

More from Margaret Fuller

  1. All around us lies what we neither understand nor use. Our capacities, our instincts for this our present sphere are but half developed. Let us confine ourselv…

    Permalink to quote #26
  2. I never lived, that I remember, what you call a common natural day. All my days are touched by the supernatural, for I feel the pressure of hidden causes, and …

    Permalink to quote #28
  3. To one who has enjoyed the full life of any scene, of any hour, what thoughts can be recorded about it, seem like the commas and semicolons in the paragraph, m…

    Permalink to quote #25

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