A Beginners Guide To Visualization
Download as PPTX, PDF0 likes144 views
The document emphasizes the power of visualization as a technique for achieving personal goals and enhancing self-discipline. It discusses how harnessing the subconscious mind can help individuals overcome negative thought patterns and attract positive life experiences. By focusing on ideal outcomes and utilizing visualization, one can effectively prepare for future situations and improve their overall performance in various areas of life.
A Beginners Guide To Visualization
- 2. Think about something that you’ve always wanted to do, but never felt was within your capability. What kind of life do you most wish that you could lead? How would you feel in that ideal life? What would you look like, and what would you do? Are you a successful career person? Are you traveling the world and grasping your destiny one location at a time? Have you finally lost the extra weight you have been feeling bad about and living a healthier lifestyle? Any of these goals are within your grasp. And there is very little that we can’t achieve if we simply begin to harness the untapped potential within our own minds. Our brains are supercomputers that are specially designed to help us to accomplish our goals and to survive in the world. It is constantly processing the information surrounding us and the things and people that we encounter on a day to day basis. By harnessing the power of our minds and learning how to tap into it so that we can start controlling the results, we take ourselves that much closer to living the life we most want to live, before it is too late. IF you are new to visualization, don’t worry! Everybody starts somewhere, and in this beginner’s guide, we will show you the ropes and give you a good clue as to how and why visualization can turn out goals into our realities. Our subconscious mind is a powerful place, and when it is working in our favor rather than against us, the potential for us to achieve is unlimited! But don’t take our word for it. Instead, see for yourself just how powerful it can be to unlock your subconscious mind and tap into your own powers through visualization today!
- 3. Over the years, many people have worked to figure out exactly how the human body works and how we can most efficiently use the tools at our disposal. We have the opposable thumbs, we have the memory power, and we have the ability to craft and create, but sometimes it seems that humans simply lack one crucial element to success: self-discipline. In fact, the longer we go through life, the more baggage we seem to pick up. We learn from experiences that often teach us to believe that we lack power in our own lives and that the efforts that we put into our goals will not be worth the reward. Maybe we begin to talk ourselves out of believing that we are capable of achieving the goals that we want to set for ourselves. Maybe when we are young, we have people who tell us that we have our heads in the clouds and that doing the things we love simply isn’t an option. These kinds of situations can often leave us feeling discouraged and withdrawn. We may even begin to feel silly for wanting to shoot for the stars or for believing that we may have any power over our own destinies. Maybe we want to think that we can accomplish something and then someone else makes fun of us or questions why we care about the things we care about. Over time, without the proper support and without successes in your corner to keep your confidence boosted, it can become very difficult to keep our eyes on our true desires and instead, force ourselves to stay complacent with the lots that we have drawn. But we don’t have to stay stuck with the short end of the stick. In fact, nature has provided us with all the tools we could ever ask for when it comes to achieving our most important goals. Our brains are powerful computers that can help us to thrive. However, if they are used the wrong way, they can also be our greatest obstacles. If, over time, you have been weighed down by baggage like in the previous examples, you may find that it is incredibly difficult for you to actually make progress toward your goals. You may not even think you are worthy of success. Some people even question whether they are worthy of being loved at all, which is just silly! Everyone is worthy of living their version of their best life, and our brains, if they aren’t subconsciously holding us back from making the moves that we
- 4. need to make to improve our lives, can actually help us to attract exactly the right opportunities to help us to thrive. Back in the 1970s, athletes in the Soviet Union began to practice a technique that soon caught on across the world. These athletes would purposely think about detailed performances on the field. They would let the images play in their minds and practice mentally in their down time while their bodies were resting. The art of visualization actually helped these athletes to hone their reflexes and perform better on the field, and ever since then, it has become a popular technique for many athletes across many varieties of sports. Why? Because it works. Our brains are the stewards of our bodies. They help to direct us in the directions that we have to go and they give us the power to make lasting changes in our lives. To some extent, they control our reflexes, they control our movement and speech, and our reaction time. Depending on other bodily factors, by training our brains with visualization exercises, our daily performance in certain areas can reach new heights. And ever since that became apparent in sports practices, people have been looking into other ways that this reality can apply in a way that can change our lives. You don’t have to have a good imagination for visualization to work, although it may help. But what you do need to do is to be able to picture a scenario in your mind’s eye and to see that scenario going as well as it ever possibly could. In doing so, you are preparing your mind for events that are to come, and because it has run through this event already and has seen how it should best be performed, it has already become primed to respond to the future events in a productive and helpful way. Visualization relies on the concept of the Law of Attraction. The Law of Attraction states that whatever our mind is focusing on is what we are most likely to attract into our own lives. For example, if you keep replaying negative situations in your mind, and seeing ways that you have been let down by others rather than focusing on positive things, then you are more likely than not going to attract more of the same negative energy into your life. Negativity can easily cause us to spiral downward and get stuck in a rut, and that rut can easily lead us to feel discouraged and unworthy of positive changes in our lives. However, if we are focusing on the positive, and valuing it and focusing our energy into attracting more of the same positive energy so that we can thrive, then we are going to be able to experience more positive things than negative and because our minds are focused on a specific goal, our minds will be constantly working on ways that we can achieve that goal and reach our desired income. A popular notion for those who are learning visualization techniques is that it is important to train our brains to live as if we are already accomplished in the areas that we want to be accomplished. This will help us to have more confidence and to recognize the steps we can take and the opportunities we are presented with to help us to move forward in our lives and to create the ideal situations for us. The basic principle is that the things we think will eventually begin to shape our reality. So if we are fixated on the negative, we will attract more negative. But if we Focus on the life that we most want to live, then that is what we will attract to ourselves. And that is always the most productive thing we can do!
- 5. Have you ever had a dream that felt like it was really happening? When you woke up, your body might still have been responding to the events in the dream. You might have a real emotional reaction to the situation that you found yourself in during the dream. This is just one example of how the brain can control our bodies and lives in ways beyond our comprehension or control. Memories can act in a similar way. When we look back on things we experienced in our past, it can cause us to have physical and emotional reactions. In fact, sometimes our memories can be re-written in ways that allow us to experience something that didn’t really happen, but if we are convinced one way or another that the memory is real, we will go through life believing that the things you felt and experienced truly happened. Creativity and imagination can often be confused as actual events in the mind’s eye and create certain responses in an individual. Now imagine yourself taking control of the emotions and the events that the brain is processing. Imagine yourself coming up with the reality that your mind believes and the perspective that it works from. Think about how much more productive you would be and how much more you would accomplish if the brain was on your side instead of against you. By deciding the things that we tell our brains to focus on, we essentially empower ourselves at our deepest level to help us to enhance our moods and find confidence in our actions and goals. As the popular saying goes, “seeing is believing.” If our brains see something, they will ultimately not be able to tell the difference between the truth and reality. Have you ever been afraid of a horror movie even though you know that it isn’t real? It’s the same kind of concept. Visualization can help in so many ways. It has even been used to help stroke victims to prevent the atrophy of their muscles. Simply visualizing the movement of their bodies is enough to trigger our brain to direct the blood flow to the places it should be. It can even prevent the brain from being negatively impacted by blood clots and reoxygenate areas that would otherwise be in danger from the impact of the stroke. Visualization works in a way that repetitive words and lists and plans don’t. If the brain can see your plan, then it can make the necessary allowances to help us to achieve our goals. We can go blue in the
- 6. face telling ourselves what to think. But at the end of the day it can be one of the most difficult ways to enact change in our lives. Sometimes people aren’t positively impacted by this strategy at all and instead find themselves feeling defeated and discouraged and increasing the stress in their lives because of how badly they want to make the positive changes but they don’t seem to be coming along in the way they need to see progress. Our brains can easily tune out an overload of information that doesn’t seem relevant to any specific circumstances, however, if it is stimulated visually, then it makes that much more difference. We are visual creatures and often learn through action and observation. We have been biologically designed in a wat that ensures that visualization is a technique that will help us to prepare for our lives and help us to survive. Every single one of us is capable of taking our performances to a new level, and the technique of visualization can only serve to help us do so in an easier way. Processing images and implementing them to our daily lives is a great way to help us prepare for the future. Imagining a situation or a conversation going well can help us to feel the confidence that we need to ensure that these situations or conversations actually do go well. Consider it practice for your brain in events that matter the most. This is how athletes benefit so much from visualization. When they aren’t even physically practicing out on the field, they can visualize themselves making the play they are meant to make and responding properly to issues they may be struggling with. It’s an advantage that we allow ourselves so that our reflex time is getting more practice than simple physical repetition. We are preparing our brains to respond appropriately to a given situation and allowing ourselves the ability to do so. It not only helps us maintain the confidence that we need to keep a level head in situations that may otherwise feel overwhelming, but it allows us time to prepare a response that we can be proud of. Visualization is a powerful tool that can have a real and legitimate effect on the body. But as you may be able to imagine, this can also be problematic for us if we are stuck in negative thought cycles. If we are constantly worrying about bad things happening to us or around us, there may come a point where our brains manifest that negativity into depression or other difficulties in emotions. It may help you to sabotage yourself and create the negative situations that you are most afraid of. This is why it’s always important to maintain a positive outlook on life, even when things are the most difficult they possibly could be. If we are fixated on the bad and imagining bad things happening that haven’t yet, it will cause stress to the body that sometimes we can’t even comprehend. These issues can manifest physically and mentally and impair us in our daily lives. Don’t let this happen to you! Instead, harness the power of visualization to help you to become the person that you want to be. Imagine the absolute best case scenario for you and your life and lift that stress right off of your shoulders. It may seem strange to think about how much power our thoughts and mental images actually have, but at the end of the day they can be incredibly beneficial or incredibly harmful. Only we can decide which it is an how our lives will be affected. Try to make the right choice!
- 7. Another useful way to utilize visualization is for communication. Business firms will sometimes pay thousands of dollars for visualization software that helps them to translate data into visual graphs and other things that can help our minds to process the information more easily and effectively. These graphs help us to communicate the financial messages about our business in a way that we can present to partners, employees, and people who may potentially want to work with us. Our minds can take these visualizations of data and really comprehend the most important aspects of a business in a very effective way. It turns data into a language that we can understand more easily than trying to sift through pages and pages of cold, hard facts. It can be a great tool in making sure that everything an employee or partner needs to know is digestible and as helpful as possible. Another way that visualization has helped us throughout history is the alphabet. Starting with the cave men, visualization has been a way for us to communicate thoughts and information to other people without actually being physically present. Cave paintings told of the animals in the area, the actions of the people who lived there, and told stories about the things that were valued most by the humans in the area. This style of visualization eventually evolved into language. The symbols gradually began to represent sounds and concepts that could be carried throughout the civilization and used to communicate thoughts and ideas and memories and experiences. Many cultures use or used pictures as their primary element for their alphabet. The Egyptians are perhaps the most notable in this department, as they etched pictures to represent ideas and words. The Chinese alphabet also began this way. Their words are characterized by pictures that represent specific things; trees, animals, and gates just to name a few examples. Visualization was a way that many of the ancient people were able to create and maintain a successful method of communication and, eventually, manifestation. This is, perhaps, also applicable in the case of pagan languages and practices as well. Ancient people used pictures and objects that represented symbols in the mind that helped them to focus their
- 8. thoughts and make their devotions to their deities. It has worked in so many ways over the centuries that it is indisputable what difference it can make in helping us to manifest our own power. Consider geometry. This is all visualization of abstract ideas and shapes, but it helps us to represent what needs to be done in order to create incredibly powerful structures and technologies. Over time, it has proven again and again to be the most reliable form of mathematics to bring shapes together in a way that allows us to conceptualize future images and bring them into being. It is a powerful tool, and without visualization, it wouldn’t even exist! Now, in the modern age, we have science to help us to understand the power of visualization and how it can work in our own minds and bodies. When we show our minds an image, the brain experiences that image in a way that can be helpful to us. It could also potentially be harmful, depending on the context, so always try to be mindful of the things that you present to yourself and to those in your care, like young children and other impressionable people who may not have the same knowledge or self discipline that you do. That being said, history has shown time and again just how impactful visualization can be and it has even helped us to form entire societies and communicate with one another in new and exciting ways. It has paved the way for progress to be made, and changed the world in thousands of different ways. The power of visualization is real, and if we use it wisely, it can be something that not only changes our own lives but the rest of society as well!
- 9. Okay, so now that you have convinced yourself that visualization works and you understand how it can impact your life, how do you even begin to implement it? Where do we even begin? The very first thing we need to do to make sure that visualization is the most effective thing possible in our lives is to learn how to rid ourselves of the negativity bias. The negativity bias is something that has harmed us probably our whole lives and throughout all of human history. So what is the negativity bias exactly? The negativity bias is a psychological state that can prioritize negative thoughts and feelings over positive ones. For example, if we experience painful or traumatizing events, those tend to impact us more than things that aren’t as extreme or even positive. The way we act tends to be more influenced by the negative events in our lives than by the positive events. It can cause us to view things in a biased light and assume that we are not worthy of the positive lives and circumstances that we most want in our lives. It can also cause us to stop valuing the good things in favor of feeling pain over the bad things. Visualization can work against us if we are not aware of the negativity bias. If we are replaying the bad things again and again, it takes up space in our minds and leads us to having a much harder time attracting the positive situations that we want. We will wallow in the things that hurt us rather than believing that the good things are possible. But that isn’t because good things don’t happen to us or aren’t capable of happening; it’s because we are not placing value in the positive things or even allowing ourselves to believe that the positive things are possible. As you can imagine, the negativity bias is one of the most damaging factors in many of our lives. It can prevent us from making progress and cause us to stay trapped in a negative mindset where we almost begin to be relieved when bad things happen to us because our neural pathways have begun to anticipate these things. People can become physically addicted to drama and their own misfortunes, to the point that they begin to create more and more negative situations for themselves rather than creating positive situations and moving forward in their lives.
- 10. Fortunately, the neural pathways are not set in stone and they can be remapped in a way that allows us to believe in the possibility of our own progress and make the changes we need to make to become more productive and successful people. When we are able to overcome the negativity bias, then truly believing in our visualizations is that much easier. So how do we even begin to do this? Well, the first step is to practice mindfulness. Become aware of your destructive patterns and the thoughts that you have that interrupt your ability to focus on the good in your life. Interrupt your bad thought patterns with distractions and reminders of positive things. One of the ways that you can do this effectively is to write gratitude journals. You can also try mindfulness meditations, uplifting conversations with your support network, and looking at pictures of things that make you smile. For example, if you feel yourself spiraling into a negative mood, interrupting that mood with positive images of things that make you happy will eventually decrease the strength of the negative neural pathway in your mind and you will be less prone to following the negative thoughts and you will be able to prevent yourself from spiraling into a depression or a mood that is more destructive than constructive. We all have the power to re-train our brains, and in order for visualization to have the greatest impact on our lives, we have to stop doubting that we are worthy of the lives we want. This belief has to be real and strong, and taking care of our negativity bias is a crucial step in effectively paving the way toward a productive and successful life. Now that you are aware of the dangers of the negativity bias, let’s jump into some of the techniques that we can use to help us to use visualization to our benefit and manifest the best life possible!
- 11. Our brains love pictures. They love images and concepts that are broken down into stories that we can experience an enjoy. There is a reason why human beings have celebrated entertainment since the Ancient Greeks had their coliseums. We want to see exciting things and we celebrate art because they help us to experience and see different points of view without having to experience them for ourselves in person. One of the secrets to successful visualization is to have a physical reminder that we can focus our attention on. We work most efficiently if we understand the benefits to our hard work. If we don’t see the end game clearly, we may find ourselves wavering and losing the motivation to move forward. If we don’t see how we are moving forward and constantly feel stuck without really allowing ourselves to believe that there is anything better out there for us that is possible, then ultimately we are preventing ourselves from moving in the direction we need to go. A great way to begin successful visualization is to create a vision board. It is important to be able to see what it is we want and what it is we are working for. The best part about vision boards is that they work. If we are able to put pictures and reminders of our goals in an area that we can view it consistently and keep our minds focused on the task at hand, then our minds will help us by doing a whole lot of the work we need it to do without question. What we focus on is what we attract into our lives, and if we are unfocused then we will only attract more of the same. However, if we focus on making progress and getting ourselves to a better place, then we need to make the effort to achieve those things. A vision board can give us reminders of any goal that we have for ourselves. It could be a visualization of our goals for health and fitness, for success with business, with staying positive, or with career advancement. Whatever the case may be, a vision board can be created for it. So how do you make a vision board, anyway? It’s simple. Look around for pictures that represent the life you want to create for yourself. You can find these images just about anywhere. You can cut them out of magazines or copy them out of books, or you can do a search online and print them out. it can
- 12. help to have a bulletin board for these things, but it isn’t required. You could even just create a collage on a piece of paper of poster board. The main thing is to make sure you place it somewhere that you will observe it consistently and on a daily basis. Somewhere that your eye will wander to it and you will be reminded visually of the life you want and the life you want your mind to believe that you are living in the moment. But don’t just put pictures of your physical goals, like a good body or a nice house. Think about how you want yourself to feel in this better life. Put images that remind you of the emotional peace you want to achieve as well. Determine how you want to feel and encourage your mind to focus on these things. Do you want to feel happy? Calm? Productive? Confident? Seeing these representations of the emotions that you desire will automatically trigger your mind into creating impressions of those feelings. It is up to you whether or not you let yourself experience them, and looking at these desired states of mind will eventually have the desired affect if you believe that you really can and really do feel these things. A lot of the time, a negative state of mind or emotional state will just make things worse. And no matter where we are or what we are going through, we can try to exercise some control over our emotional states. A vision board can help us to gain the control over our emotions that we need most so that we can live the most comfortable and productive life imaginable. The purpose of a vision board is to help you to stay motivated. The more motivated you are to make productive decisions, the more productive decisions you are going to make. Think about your goals and then find an image that will help you to stay focused on the work you need to put in to achieve those goals. If you are focused on achieving things rather than sitting around feeling lost and unfocused, then you are guaranteed to make more productive choices in your life. Reminding your brain of what you want and what you need and making your goals clear in a way that helps our brains to process them and focus on what we need to do to accomplish those goals will help you to stay the course. Even if you have some discouragement, you can look to your vision board as a reminder of the good things that are yet to come rather than feeling as if all the work you are doing is going toward nothing. Having a physical representation of our goals is a great and important way to help us to stay focused. It can be easy to get swept away in our own discouraging thoughts and negative feelings. We never feel the progress we are making in a way that is rewarding in the moment. Rather, we end up not seeing our steps forward at all because we are so immersed in living in the moment. That is why it can be so encouraging to remember why you are working and to celebrate your little victories. A vision board can help us do that!
- 13. Manifestation plays a huge role in the process of visualization. What we focus on is what we allow to manifest in our lives, and creating the life we want can be so much easier if we are allowing our minds to do the work for us. Of course, there will still be steps that we need to take in creating this perfect life and the attitude that we most need in order to thrive and feel the best in our own lives. We still need to put the work into the goals we want to achieve. Not everything will happen automatically. But we can absolutely help to wire our brains in a way that makes it easier for us to achieve those goals. One of the techniques that we can and should use is utilizing affirmations. Affirmations are words or phrases that we repeat to ourselves that will help us to focus our minds on a specific desired outcome. For example, if somebody has a tendency to get frustrated with other people, an affirmation they might want to say to themselves every day is something like, “I am a patient person and I don’t respond with anger in situations where it is not required.” By telling this to your brain, it will begin to believe it and sooner or later, it will help you to become a person who is patient and who doesn’t go off over the little things. Affirmations are powerful tools in anybody’s arsenal, and they can help us to stay focused on our target goals and maintain control over our emotional equilibrium. If we tell ourselves who we are and what we are going to do, then more likely than not, that is who we will be and what we will do. It’s so simple it almost doesn’t seem possible. And yet it works! Affirmations can also help somebody who isn’t organized to stay organized, or who isn’t focused to stay focused. If you wake up exhausted today but you know that you have a deadline to meet, telling yourself that you are a productive person who can work through the challenges is a great way to force yourself to be that person and to stay focused despite your difficulties. If we believe we can do something, then we are usually able to do it. If we tell ourselves who and what we are, then we are usually able to believe it. And we perform accordingly.
- 14. Affirmations are a way to incorporate your goals into your daily life. If you want to achieve great things but you are your own worst enemy, as we all can be, then reciting affirmations on a daily basis can really help to reform your mindset. You can tell yourself what you will accomplish and it will help to motivate you to get that thing accomplished without any excuses. It is a way to stay accountable to yourself and to use your own mind’s power to help you to stay motivated in your favor. Affirmations have been used for centuries with great success. They can also be called mantras, and are a way for us to train our minds to focus on what is truly important to us so we can live our lives with true intention rather than allowing our moods and behaviors to be impacted by our unstable emotional perception of the world around us and our own lives. Another useful way to use affirmations is to combat the negativity bias that was mentioned in the previous chapter. The negativity bias certainly needs to be broken. And what better way to interrupt a negative thought or feeling than with an affirmation that you are capable, confident, and important, and that you will achieve your goals? These powerful tools can help to disrupt the destructive thought patterns that sabotage your life and prevent you from living up to your full potential. Don’t turn your back on them; they can be life changing if you allow them to be! Stating your affirmations are great if you do it silently, but they tend to have more power if they are something that you verbalize. Affirmations can be repeated several times a day if you are able to find yourself in a safe space where you are able to relax and focus on your intentions. You can incorporate them into meditations and you can focus on your affirmation for a few minutes every morning so that you can really give your morning routine a boost. Mornings are very important because they tend to set the tone for our entire day. If you have a good routine then you are more likely to be able to work successfully toward your goals and maintain a balanced and positive outlook. Including a few minutes every morning for daily affirmations can quickly begin to change your life. You may immediately begin to notice a difference. The more powerful you believe you are, the more powerful you are. If you feel confident and capable, then you are going to act confident and capable. Your decisions will not suffer from indecisiveness and fear, because you will trust your instincts implicitly and you will not be looking to others to make choices for you. This can be dangerous because we can begin to lose control of the authority we have over our own lives. We have to be able to trust ourselves to make the right choices even if we haven’t succeeded yet. We have to trust ourselves to be able to make positive emotional changes and to master our emotions, even if we haven’t always been able to do that. We have to forgive ourselves for our past mistakes and work hard to move forward and do everything that we need to do in order to succeed and provide ourselves with the lives that we want and deserve. Positive affirmations are just one step in the right direction, but it is a powerful tool and this type of visualization can really help to encourage us to be the people we most want to be and to achieve the daily goals that we set for ourselves. When we are accomplishing our goals, we will build more and more confidence in ourselves and in our instincts, and ultimately we will be able to have the lives we always dreamed about!
- 15. Have you ever wanted something but you weren’t quite sure how to get there? Or maybe you have secretly thought about something that you want to do and never allowed yourself to consider it a possibility. So instead, maybe you pushed it to the back of your mind and don’t allow yourself to pursue it as a serious option for you. Have you ever thought to yourself about just how discouraging that is for you? Why don’t you let yourself think about what you want? If you focus on what you want, then it will become a priority for you. It won’t just be a dream that you have shoved into the back of your closet, only to look back on it later with sadness and fondness. If you allow it to take up important space in your mind and focus on it, then it will become a priority. It doesn’t matter if you have to work at something else at the same time as you are working to create the reality that you want most. Everybody has to start somewhere and do things they might not enjoy before they are able to really live the life they idealize for themselves. Don’t be discouraged by these situations; instead, feel grateful that you are able to maintain your life and accumulate the resources you need to start putting toward your goals! One great way to begin to get yourself on track is to write your goals down. Make them real, and make them important. Write them all out so you have a visual reference for what it is you envision for yourself. Let it be important, and let it be a priority. Don’t be afraid of failing at your goal just because it is more meaningful to you than other things in your life may be. Don’t let that discourage you from trying, or from starting something new. In fact, you have to let yourself fall sometimes. If you don’t do things wrong then you will never learn how to do them right. So many successful people had failure after failure under their belts. Famous and rich authors will proudly show you the stack of rejection letters that they had accumulated over the years. You are not the only one who has ever made a mistake, and you will not be the last. So get over those fears and let yourself picture the best life possible for yourself! It doesn’t matter how small the goal is. You can write it out and reference it. You can put your list of goals on your vision board. You can find an appropriate picture to represent the goal on your list and
- 16. include that on your vision board as well. In fact, you could use your goal list as inspiration for your entire vision board if you wanted to! It is important that we are able to write out the things that we want to do. Sometimes, we may end up being surprised by ourselves and the things that will make us happy. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t explore these things. it just means that we have a new and surprising goal that could eventually really help us feel satisfied in our lives! When writing out your goals, however, be careful not to fixate on breaking every single goal down into the specific steps that you need to take in order to achieve your goals. While it is very important to be able to know what you need to do to accomplish a goal, and it can be very helpful to map out a path for yourself, visualization can suffer from all the dry fact and detail that we put into a list. Some people can use lists as a way to try and control things that they can’t usually control. They can provide us with a false sense of control, so that when something on our to do list goes wrong, we crumble and feel it acutely if our perceived solution fails us. Lists can box us in and keep us from seeing other potential in our lives and opportunities that might help us get where we want to be in a faster and more efficient way. We don’t want to be boxed in; we want our minds to be free to attract the things that we need right to us without being told that it’s not doing a good enough job. Overall, the law of attraction can work pretty smoothly. Writing out our goals is one of many ways that we can allow it to bring its bounty into our lives and help us to stay motivated toward achieving the life we want!
- 17. As the popular adage says, “don’t try…do!” All of us are capable of being the best version of ourselves possible. But there’s a catch to this. We have to actually believe that we are capable of doing it and achieving our goals. Visualization techniques are great because they convince our minds that we are already living the best life that we can live. It gets us in the mindset to attract more of the things we want because we are thinking to ourselves that we are already living in abundance. The law of attraction will help us to attract to us the things that we are focused on. One undeniable fact of this world is that there is energy in everything; even in our thoughts. If our energy is focused on negativity, we attract more negativity to ourselves. And when we are growing up and at the mercy of the adults around us, more often than not our power is buried. We stop believing we are capable of doing things for ourselves and often get used to not having full control over ourselves or our circumstances. But when we are grown, the truth is that now we do have full control. We determine the consequences of our actions and we have to be focused on creating the lives that will be most beneficial to us. Only we know what it is we want and need the most, and as such we are the ones who are the most in control and we are the ones who have to be accountable for creating the lives and situations that we need in order to become the best versions of ourselves possible. But we doubt ourselves. We remember all the times the things that we wanted or valued weren’t given to us. We remember all the times we made mistakes and things went wrong in ways we didn’t know how to repair. We remember being powerless, and we often carry this attitude and discouragement with us throughout the rest of our lives. This is a dangerous mindset to have, and it is an attitude that can cause untold damage and ultimately prevent us from becoming the people we most want to be. We have to reclaim our own power and remember that we have authority over what happens to us. We also have to believe that when we set out to do something, we will have the resources and drive to achieve those things. When we use a visualization technique to focus on the goal we want, we can’t just sit there and think, “this is what I
- 18. want.” We have to tell ourselves, “this is what is going to happen.” Then, it is only a matter of letting our brains help us to figure out how to manifest it. There is so much power in being able to believe that we are capable of achieving our goals. It prevents us from getting discouraged or distracted. It helps us to take steps forward rather than staying still and feeling stuck. We don’t talk ourselves out of doing the things that need done to advance, because our success is already guaranteed. We aren’t telling ourselves that our work is for nothing. We are working because we know that there will be a reward for us at the end of our toils. We know that what we are doing will be worth it. There is no question about it whatsoever. When we believe we will succeed, then we take all the stress of uncertainty out of the equation so we can focus on our own power and our ability to get from point a to point b. There is nothing wrong with being ambitious. There is nothing condescending about knowing that what you want to gain is coming to you. In fact, it is far more beneficial to you because sending that energy out into the world will only bring back more of the same. Live your life with a mindset of abundance. Know that there are plenty of resources and wealth in the world and that some of it can easily find its way to you. Don’t let yourself think that just because you are not in a position of accomplishment yet that it isn’t possible and that it’s not on the horizon for you. Believe in yourself, and believe in your goal. Tell yourself that it is possible, that it is already waiting for you at the end of your struggles, and live your life knowing that you are going to get there eventually. When we do that, we get there a lot faster and our confidence in ourselves will skyrocket beyond anything we might have ever imagined when we were kids being told that what we want isn’t possible. Only you can decide what is possible for yourself. There are many people out there in the world who don’t like to see an optimistic person. They will point out every single little thing that is wrong with your logic, they will tell us that we don’t have the ability to succeed in this way or that. They will give us anecdotes and personal experiences that seem to them to prove that we are living in the clouds and that nothing we do is ever going to be good enough to achieve the things we most want to achieve. But these people are not you. Just because they have dug themselves into a rut doesn’t mean that you have to do the same. But you can learn from their negative attitudes. Are these people successful in their lives? Have they lived out their goals and achieved the things they most wanted to? Are they living the best life they possibly can? The chances are high that no, they have not done those things. These are people who have been painfully disappointed in their lives and were not able to gather their strength to try again. maybe they have heard these types of negative comments themselves and they have begun to believe it. As mentioned previously in this book, it can be extremely dangerous for the mind to stay fixated on the negative things and sooner or later, you will begin to believe the things that you hear consistently and ultimately attract more of the things that you are focused on. If you are focused on the futility of your effort and how pointless it seems to be able to do anything, then you will remain powerless and attract more failure and misery to yourself. However, you can use visualization in a way that can benefit you rather than hinder you. You can become the master of your own destiny by utilizing the techniques of visualization in a way that will allow you to fully capture the power in your own mind and attract success to you. One thing that can help is to surround yourself only with other successful people. People who understand the value of a hard day’s work and who understand that we are
- 19. toxic and discouraging people in your life can be so rejuvenating and refreshing. We don’t need to be influenced by other people’s negative energy and unproductive mindsets. We don’t need to surround ourselves with people who are more focused on petty arguments and ego conflicts than they are in improving themselves and becoming better people who are focused on achieving great things with their lives. When we are able to do this, then we are truly able to embrace our own power and believe without any hesitation that our goals are as good as accomplished. The steps we need to take to get there won’t feel like they are dragging out and leading us to nothing. We will know that every move we make is meaningful and we will attract people and situations into our lives that will help us to become the best version of ourselves possible in the shortest possible amount of time. Don’t let yourself waver, and don’t get impatient for your goals to be achieved. Just let yourself believe that when you set a goal, it is as good as done. And then you will be able to tap into all the previously unharnessed potential within yourself to make these things possible. You can achieve your goals and dreams, and visualization will help you to get there. As long as you are selective with the energy that you surround yourself with and you don’t let yourself get discouraged from believing you will succeed, then this will be one of the most powerful visualization techniques that you can utilize to make sure you achieve your goals in the shortest amount of time possible. But don’t take our word for it; try it out for yourself!
- 20. This technique can kind of be related back to the vision board technique. When we create images of the life that we want, it can be incredibly empowering. Our minds are able to harness the power to help us find resources and other support that can move us forward in our journey faster. It prevents us from feeling discouraged from doing the work it takes to accomplish our goals. It is a mindset change that can really make all the difference between doing something productively and wasting our time. Ultimately, the idea of including an image of yourself with pictures of the life you want works in many ways. Our minds recognize us, and although it may not recognize the situation you are in as a memory, it will help us to maintain the mindset and the energy that is needed for us to truly begin to believe that we are living the life we want already. Living with this mindset is a sure way to help us to benefit from the law of attraction. When we are focused on the life that we want and we are in the habit of believing that we are already in a position of abundance, then we will simply attract more abundance toward us. Consider how easy it is to find yourself in debt, with more debt seeming to effortlessly find its way to you. If you are already living in debt and focused on this debt, then it will easily attract more debt to you. But if you believe that you are already living abundantly and you have the resources that you need in order to achieve your goals and live the life that will most benefit you, then you will attract more resources and opportunities to yourself with little effort. That is the law of attraction. Ultimately, inserting yourself into pictures of the life that you want is a good tool. It helps the mind to think that we are already living in a place of abundance, and it will focus on generating more of that abundance. The energy that we put out into the universe will provide us with more opportunities to gain. Not only that, but there is science to say that when the mind is focused on a specific goal, it will go into a problem-solving mode that will make you aware, consciously and unconsciously, of the steps that you need to take to attract the most opportunities for you to thrive. It doesn’t just work on an unseen vibrational frequency. That sounds a little hokey, although it does seem to be legitimate regardless. It works on a simple, psychological level. When we are mulling over
- 21. a problem or a puzzle, our minds are focused on helping us to figure it out. There are theories that this is why we dream; it is a chance for our brains to try an mull through our problems so that we can find solutions or find emotional or psychological closure in situations that are troubling us. The same can be said of the subconscious mind. We are constantly taking in information around us and our brain stores it all. Even if we aren’t conscious of a possible solution to a problem we are having, when the mind is focused on that problem and detects that it needs to come up with a solution, it will be working on that solution even at times when we are unaware of it. This is why we get the occasional “aha!” moment. It is our minds finally coming up with a great goal or a plan that will help us to bridge the gap between the situations we are in and our ideal outcomes. And so, when we are focused on the fact that we want to live this certain lifestyle, our brain will be working subconsciously for a way to help us to go in the direction of that lifestyle. It will be constantly trying to figure out how to bridge the gap between the people we are now and our current situations and the lifestyle that we desire for ourselves. And when it comes up with these solutions, it will let us know, whether subconscious or conscious. It will lead us in directions we might never have gone before for reasons we might not fully understand until we finally see that we have aided ourselves in truly achieving the life that we want by following our intuition and letting our minds take the wheel for a while. A powerful way to encourage our brains to bridge the gaps is to show it images of us in the environment we want most to be in. Whether that is a nice home or a great corner office, superimposing a picture of yourself in that environment will help our brains get the memo that this is what our focus should be and give it the encouragement it needs to help us to consolidate our goals with our reality. You can do this any number of ways. If you have computer skills, you could use photoshop to put a picture of yourself in your ideal environment. You could also just cut and paste and put a picture of yourself with a picture of the environment you most want to be surrounded with. However you choose to make use of this visualization technique, the mind will get the message. We have so many resources already at our disposal, but so many of them work below the surface and in mysterious ways that we might not fully understand. Science may be working on it, but the one thing it knows for sure is that the brain is a visual creature and it will help us to solve the problems that we are most focused on. So work on believing that you are living the life you want and give your brain the clues that it needs to help us along the way! You will be so glad you did.
- 22. Visualization is a technique that has existed in the world for centuries and centuries. It began with the cave paintings, it evolved our ability to communicate through spoken and written word, and it has been helping human beings to achieve their goals for more years than we will ever see in our lifetimes. It has been a powerful tool in aiding healing and improving physical performance, and it has served so many in their ability to perform mentally as well. Time and again it has proven to be a tried and true method of helping us to harness our own power and to live the life we most want. As with anything, there will be naysayers out there who don’t believe it works. They will be convinced that their way is the only way ad that nobody will ever be able to achieve things just by talking to themselves and looking at pictures. But if you look closely at these people you are going to find they all have one thing in common; they are not happy with themselves in some way, and they are probably used to being disappointed. You can handle these one of two ways. You can suggest that they give visualization a try for themselves and explain to them how the negativity bias works. You can let them know that by focusing on their negative thoughts and defeat, they are only attracting more of the same to themselves. You can tell them about the power of the subconscious brain and ways that they can begin to harness the power for themselves rather than trying to rain on your parade. You can show them the pathway to success and let them try it out for themselves. Or, you can ignore them. You can determine that their energy is too negative for you to be around and you can do everything in your power to only surround yourself with positive and successful people who will encourage you to do everything in your power to achieve your goals. Successful people are aware of the power of positivity. They are aware of the way that their minds can influence their actions and they are aware of techniques that they can use in order to make their own lives better and stay focused on their goals. They will never put down another person for their methods. Instead, they might try and find the ways that they can learn from them and implement them in their own lives.
- 23. However you decide to handle a situation like this, know that other people’s thoughts and feelings are not your responsibility to change or help or encourage. What you need to focus your mind on is your goals. Practicing visualization techniques are an incredible way to get you started on a journey that you might never have seen yourself embarking on, but it is one you are sure to have success with. Overall, utilizing visualization techniques is a way that you can improve your life and become more confident and motivated. You will be able to embrace your own power and utilize the power of your subconscious mind to make decisions that will help you to meet your goals and become the person you have always wanted to be. But this is something you have to apply yourself with. You can do everything that you need to do, and you can achieve the goals you set for yourself. Believe that success is at the end of the road for yourself, and don’t talk yourself out of it. Get rid of your negativity bias and the people in your life who are holding you back. Focus on yourself and prepare your brain with the visuals and the mental encouragement it needs to focus on working through your current problems and creating a space of success in your future endeavors. The power you need to create the life you want is right at your fingertips. Start using visualization techniques today to see for yourself just how powerful you are and to begin to make the changes that you need to make in your life to become the best version of yourself possible. It is up to you to do the work, but then you can sit back and let your own mind do the rest. Don’t take our word for it though. Try these techniques out and find out for yourself just how much power you have over your own destiny!