This paper argues that just as imagination has been important for the inception and promotion of invitational education, it is also necessary for the development of inviting research strategies. Applying the educative process to the study of inviting, recommendations are made for relating the constituent parts of the inviting stance (optimism, respect, trust, and intentionality) and factors (people, places, policies, and programs) to construct an imaginative research structure. Next, a heuristic analysis of the inviting process is presented in a series of imaginative monologues as they might be delivered by the theorists Edward de Bono, Donald Schon, and Abraham Edel. The analysis from de Bono's perspective generates questions based on his "six hat thinking" model, finally emphasizing the role of optimism, emotion, and intuition in invitational education and the need to promote creative and reflective thinking. A critique in the manner of Schon shows vacillation in invitational education between technical rationality and an epistemology of practice, and an ambiguity between a salesmanship stance and true mutuality. Edel's work is used to connect invitational education with several larger social issues: global perspective, equality, democratization, responsible technology, competition, community, and humanism. The final section of the paper suggests a metaphor, model and method for integrating theory, research, and practice. (Author/LPG)