Released on the Gordy (Motown) label, and produced by Norman Whitfield, it features on the group's 1971 album, Sky's the Limit.

During the process of recording and releasing the single, Kendricks left the group to begin a solo career, while the ailing Williams was forced to retire from the act for health reasons.

[4] A full orchestral arrangement with strings and French horns adorning a bluesy rhythm track and bass line provides the instrumentals.

Music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine of allmusic notes that the song is narrated by a man who imagines a relationship with the woman he loves, is canny enough to realize that his daydreams are fiction, yet is overwhelmed by them.

The first two verses establish the theme and explore the narrator's daydreams, in which he and the object of his affections are lovers preparing to be married, to "raise a family" and build "a cozy little home / out in the country / with two children, maybe three".

"[5] During the late 1960s and early 1970s, producer/composer Norman Whitfield and lyricist Barrett Strong crafted a string of "psychedelic soul" tracks for the Temptations.

[7] In a 1991 interview, Eddie Kendricks recalled that many of the Temptations' fans were "screaming bloody murder" after the group delved into psychedelia, and demanded a return to their original soul sound.

Whitfield arranged and recorded the non-orchestral elements of the instrumental with Motown's studio band, The Funk Brothers, who for this recording included Eddie Willis and Dennis Coffey on guitar, Jack Ashford on marimba, Jack Brokensha on timpani, Andrew Smith on drums, and Bob Babbitt on bass.

The song was recorded in the midst of a bitter feud between Kendricks and the Temptations' de facto leader, Otis Williams.

Nevertheless, Williams was impressed by Kendricks' performance on the recording, and in his 1988 Temptations biography referred to "Just My Imagination" as "Eddie's finest moment".

[11] Paul Williams, the Temptations' original lead singer and Kendricks' lifelong best friend, who sings the first line in the bridge ("Every night, on my knees, I pray..."), had suffered for three years from health problems related to alcoholism and sickle-cell disease.

The Temptations performed "Just My Imagination" and "Get Ready" for their final appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, broadcast live on January 31.

On-screen, for "Get Ready" Kendricks stood several feet away from the other Temptations, and made little eye contact with them, and for ""Just My Imagination" sat on a separate piece of staging; Otis Williams later remarked that one could see the group was no longer a complete unit: But there was such a bittersweet feeling.