Invisible Companions: Encounters with Imaginary Friends, Gods, Ancestors, and Angels

Spiritual Phenomena

by J. Bradley Wigger

From the US to Nepal, author J. Bradley Wigger travels five countries on three continents to hear children describe their invisible friends―one-hundred-year-old robins and blue dogs, dinosaurs and teapots, pretend families and shape-shifting aliens―companions springing from the deep well of childhood imagination. Drawing on these interviews, as well as a new wave of developmental research, he finds a fluid and flexible quality to the imaginative mind that is central to learning, co-operation, and paradoxically, to real-world rationality. Yet Wigger steps beyond psychological territory to explore the religious significance of the kind of mind that develops relationships with invisible beings. Alongside Cinderella the blue dog, Quack-Quack the duck, and Dino the dinosaur are angels, ancestors, spirits, and gods. What he uncovers is a profound capacity in the religious imagination to see through the surface of reality to more than meets the eye. Punctuated throughout by children's colorful drawings of their see-through interlocutors, the book is highly engaging and alternately endearing, moving, and humorous. Not just for parents or for those who work with children, Invisible Companions will appeal to anyone interested in our mind's creative and spiritual possibilities.

Genres: Religion

256 pages, Hardcover

Published July 23, 2019

Reviews

[Bogi Takács]

Impulse borrow from the new shelf of my university library. An interesting hybrid work, from a religious studies scholar who performed both qualitative and quantitative (!) cross-cultural (!!) investigations of children's imaginary friends. (He does talk about how "imaginary" is kind of stigmatizing, and he learned to avoid this terminology in interviews - but it is the usual term in the literature, so I suppose that is why it is in the subtitle.)

The book reads very conversational, rather unlike an academic volume, but this makes it a good read for anyone interested in the topic and not just a narrow segment of religious studies scholars. I'd also recommend it to parents. I'll have to read some of the author's more technical articles too, they do exist and I want to read EVERYthing now.

The theological discussion at the end went deeper than I'd expected, and one of the conclusions was refreshingly new, I did NOT see it coming - but at the same time it was also quite intuitive.

I also thought it was fascinating to see the author and his team ask children not just about imaginary friends, and about deities as appropriate in their culture, but also about kind of in-between spiritual beings like angels, ancestors, etc.; and not just "ask" but have the children perform related tasks mostly focusing on theory of mind. (Does your invisible friend / your deity of choice / an angel, an ancestor etc. know what's in a closed box? Simple tasks like that.)

I was very happy to see that cross-cultural didn't mean something like "US and UK," but the research team went to places like Malawi, Nepal and the Dominican Republic.

One small issue: I would've liked a bit more. Theory of mind and autism came up, but here I would have liked to see more discussion, because there are some contradictions in the literature. Separately, the author did bring up writers' characters gaining more autonomy, but the literature on thoughtforms, tulpas, etc. and dissociation wasn't addressed, even though it seems considerably related to me. (I did went and looked around in Google Scholar, and there is some literature that does relate practices like tulpamancy to invisible friends, and also both to autism - but all of it is quite recent, some more recent than this book, so I can hardly fault the book for that!)

All in all, a fascinating read, and with color illustrations too!
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Source of the book: KU Watson Library

[Sarah]

“But our imaginations bring flexibility and creativity and have allowed our species to travel, adapt to new environments- some very harsh- endure, and thrive. We can pose and try out alternatives to that which is, whether in our individual lives or in the world around us.

The imagination is not simply an annoyance to be tolerated among young children, but it is key to humanity, allowing us to imagine possibilities and improvise our lives. “

[Amy]

Skim read - wasn't the book I was looking for, a very developmental psych/cultural approach to studying imaginary friends.

[Sara C · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first 2/3 of the book is a great look at specific case studies, research and stories of children and their Invisible Friends. While interesting, my favorite part of the book is the last third that delves deeper into what are IFs, are they 'real'? Is God 'real' or an Imaginary Friend? These questions and the possible answers by the author are rich food for thought and have certainly led me to reevaluate my own ideas about the real, spiritual and imaginary worlds.