Long before your baby is conceived by your bodies, your minds have conjured virtual babies made up of your dreams, expectations, your own babyhoods, hopes and fears of your own parents, and your hopes and fears with each other. Some of these you know very well, some are faint impressions that you get at times, some are invisible to you like unremembered dreams. As the actual baby grows and takes shape inside the womb, her forming mind, with its own dreams of parents, seeks out your feelings, wishes, and dreams; your mind will similarly seek her out.
The imagined baby is essential for you, the parents, to invite and welcome the newcomer. The imagined baby is essential for the actual baby to sense the parents who are awaiting. Imagination, however, is no replacement for actuality, and it is the actual baby who must be ultimately recognized and appreciated. The imaginations of the parents and of the emerging baby engage each other in a kind of a dance, which under the best of circumstances leads all the participants to what is. Each step in the dance needs a leader who imagines the next move, initiates it, and waits for the follower to actualize. The dance needs a follower eager for the lead so as to improvise creatively in response to it. All the members of the family lead and follow at different times to different music. While everything can change and evolve, the first few notes of the tune do set a tone for what is to follow.