[JaredL]

Nate,

I'd be interested in a few stories where you think that quote helped you.

Personally, as a grad student I find this quote to be extremely important:

“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.”
- Einstein

It's pretty clear to me that successful students, as far as getting a job and doing well in grad school after the classes are over, spend their time thinking on working on things. The unsuccessful students tend to continue trying to learn things. They are the ones that tend to take forever to finish, or they never do, despite the fact that they work and work and work.

For those that read my other thread, I think this is one reason that I haven't been a total failure as far as grad school goes. I have come up with some nice ideas, not as many as I would like naturally, that people seem to like. Despite not having finished anything completely the potential is there.

Even outside of academia, I think creative thought is majorly helpful. For example, when fixing something it is often hugely beneficial to figure out how to do it rather than just looking up how and following the directions.