Small children have vivid imaginations. They create imaginary playmates and re-enact stories, movies, etc. Unfortunately, as we grow older we tend to lose the ability to apply imagination to our activities. In training instrument students I explain the three skills required of an instrument pilot - instrument cross-check (scanning), instrument interpretation (what are these gages telling me?) and, finally, aircraft control about the three axes through which the flying machine can move. I then try to get the student to imagine him/herself as a computer and the panel a programmer, feeding information into the computer during the scanning stage. Then I ask him or her to imagine that the roles are reversed, as the pilot becomes the programmer, making inputs into the panel through yoke, rudder, throttle and trim by means of which he/she controls the aircraft. If the student has the ability to apply imagination to his/her activity, this technique works very well and keeping the airplane upright without visual reference to the horizon becomes easy. By means of pitch, bank, power and trim the pilot causes the airplane to do what he or she wants it to do and go where he or she wants it to go.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/features/eye-of-experience-38imagination