Oh. My. Yes.
When we enter into a fictional world, or let the fictional world enter into our imaginations, we do not “willingly suspend our disbelief.” …we cannot willingly decide to believe or disbelieve anything… When engaging with fiction we do not suspend a critical faculty, but rather exercise a creative faculty. We do not actively suspend disbelief – we actively create belief. As we learn to enter into fictional spaces (and I do believe this is something that we have to learn and that requires skills we must practice and develop) we desire more and more to experience the new space more fully… To do this we can focus our attention on the enveloping world and use our creative faculties to reinforce the reality of the experience, rather than to question it.
-Sarah E. Worth, “The Paradox of Real Response to Neo-Fiction.” The Matrix and Philosophy: The Movie and the Reality. Ed. William Irwin. Open Court Press. 2002.