He's got the whole world in his hands.

In our attempt to adapt to the explosion of change thrust upon us over the past decade, we've simply cobbled up Band-Aid solutions to keep us going. Our car's been limping along and now it's up on blocks. We can no longer keep upgrading the tyres, topping up the oil and filling the water in our hemorrhaging radiator. We have to stop making do.

It's time for a new vehicle for new terrain. And the truth is, my friends, we're off the map. What an adventure.

Everywhere people are saying: "Now what?"

At the end of the Flannery interview, the floor was flooded with questions, all very worthy and scientific. I wanted to ask: "What do we tell the kids? How can we avoid inciting panic yet convey the urgency of this situation? How do we encourage them to find solutions and not paralyse them with inertia due to the colossal task ahead?"

According to Albert Einstein, imagination is more important than knowledge. We never know what world we're educating our kids for. But we do know the times ahead will be full of massive change and huge challenges. The only solution is to encourage kids to use imagination, teach them to solve problems creatively and equip them to adapt to change.

According to British education expert Sir Ken Robinson: "Creativity is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status."

He argues that we quash creativity in schools and that we're educating people out of their creative capacities — capacities we need to mine and nurture for our future now more than ever. He says we're frightened of being wrong and if we're not prepared to be wrong we'll never come up with anything original.

Due to the universal hierarchy of subjects in education —maths and languages at the top, arts at the bottom — talented, brilliant and creative people are slipping by the wayside because what they're good at isn't valued and is often stigmatised.

A part of me would love to fast-forward five years and see where we'll find ourselves, but I'm fascinated to watch how it unfolds. Who knows what's going to develop in the next few years that we'll wonder how we ever lived without and what canny ways of communicating will be cooked up next? Who knew people wanted juice bars, life coaches, Facebook, pilates, 30 flavours of dip, bottled water or prams for jogging? How can we have the answers? We don't even know what the questions are yet.

It's time to encourage imagination. Don't just be prepared to stuff up, expect it. Encourage it. Experiment. As Zorba the Greek says: "Life is trouble. Only death is not. To live is to undo your belt and look for trouble."