Visualization

Masterful Mindsets ~ Create Your Ideal Future In 10 Minutes A Day (Visualization Techniques to Affirm Your Desired Outcomes)

“Whatever goal you give to your subconscious mind, it will work night and day to achieve it.”  ~Jack Canfield

Question: 

How often do you visualize your dream life? Can you imagine yourself living it? Do you believe you can achieve it? What would you do if someone told you that you could dramatically increase your odds of creating your ideal future in just 10 minutes a day? Do you have 10 minutes to spare for the sake of making your dreams a reality?

Action Challenge:

Last week I challenged you to begin the practice of visualization to be able to clearly create your future identity because without having a clear vision for your future, it can be difficult to create it.

Visualization in its simplest form would require you to sit in a comfortable position, close your eyes and imagine (in vivid detail) what you would be experiencing if the dream you have were already a reality. The problem is, most people have never been taught how to use visualization effectively or even at all. So today I want to give you some strategies to practice visualizing your future identity as if you’ve already achieved it so you can more rapidly reach your goals and dreams.

First, let’s talk about the benefits of visualization:

Visualization techniques have been used by some of the world’s most successful high performers for centuries. The practice of visualization helps them create their desired outcomes by accomplishing one goal or task at a time with hyper focus and complete confidence.

Jack Canfield, author of Chicken Soup for the Soul, believes that using visualization techniques to focus on your goals and desires yields four very important benefits:

1. It activates your creative subconscious which will then generate creative ideas to achieve your goal.
2. It programs your brain to more readily perceive and recognize the resources you need to achieve your dreams.
3. It activates the law of attraction, thereby drawing into your life the people, resources, and circumstances you’ll need to achieve your goals.
4. It builds your internal motivation to take the necessary actions to achieve your dreams.

So how can you practice visualization? Below are some of the most common forms of visualization and how to do them:

Mental Rehearsal Technique:  Elite athletes often use a visualization process called “Mental Rehearsal”. They visualize every detail of themselves performing at the very top level to win the race, make the basket, score the goal, etc.

To practice this technique, you’ll want to set aside about 5 minutes when you first wake up and just before you go to bed (as these are the time you are most relaxed) to sit in a quiet place, close your eyes and go through the process.

This is done by imagining yourself in the moment of what you want to experience. It’s like watching a movie of yourself doing exactly what it is you want to do. The key is to see as much detail as you can create. Visualize your clothes, the expressions on your face, your every move, the environment and other people around you. Use all your senses. Hear the sounds you would here, the smells you would smell, etc. Visualize what you’d feel both externally and internally.

Then once you’ve created the entire scene, you put yourself in it completely. You watch the scene again only this time instead of watching as if you were seeing a movie on a screen, you put yourself in the scene and watch everything unfold from your own eyes. From your viewpoint as it’s happening to you. Again, seeing everything with vivid detail, hearing the sounds you would hear, smelling the smells you would smell, feeling the feelings you would feel. Then you take that image, you gather it in, and you place it in your heart.

When you have finished this process, you can open your eyes and go about your business. If you make this part of your daily routine, you will be amazed at how much improvement you will see in your life.

Dream Pictures:  Another powerful visualization technique is to find or create a picture of every aspect of your dream life. And even of yourself with your goal, as if it were already completed. (These are called “goal pictures”.)

For example, if one of your goals is to own a new car, head down to your local auto dealer and have a picture taken of yourself sitting behind the wheel of your dream car. If you dream of visiting Italy, find a picture of the Colosseum in Rome or a gondola in Venice, cut out a picture of yourself and place it into the picture. Or if you know how to photoshop pictures, give that a try. (There are great free programs out there like PicMonkey or Canva that will help you do this.)

Create a picture or a visual representation for every goal or dream you have — financial, career, hobbies, new skills and abilities, things you want to purchase, and so on. Then put them somewhere that you can see them every day. Look at them. Look at yourself within that dream every day and really let it soak in as you visualize yourself in that space.

NOTE: Creating a Vision Board is a great option here as a place to put all of your Dream Pictures in one place.

Goal Cards:  Write down each goal you are currently working on, on a 3×5 index card and keep those cards near your bed. Each morning and each night, go through the stack of cards, one at a time. Read the card, close our eyes, see the completion of that goal in its perfect desired state for about 15 seconds, open our eyes and repeat the process with the next card.

Affirmations: An affirmation is a statement that evokes not only a picture, but the experience of already having what you want. Here’s an example of an affirmation:

I am fit and healthy, happily vacationing two months out of the year with my family in a tropical paradise and working just four days a week owning my own successful business.

The “I Am Affirmation” can also be done as an excellent way to create your internal future identity. These affirmations might sound something like this:

I am confident. I am loving. I am wise. I am joyful. I am peaceful. I am brave. 

Repeating an affirmation several times a day keeps you focused on your goal, strengthens your motivation, and programs your subconscious by sending an order to your brain to do whatever it takes to make that goal happen.

Expect Results!

When you put in the time to write down your goals, use the power of visualization and repeat daily affirmations, you really can achieve amazing results.

These practices engage your subconscious in a process that can transform your life forever. They allow you to change your beliefs about yourself and the world around you. And they help you to harness the 18 billion cells in your brain to get them all working in a singular and purposeful direction. The direction of your dreams!

My challenge to you is to practice at least one or for best results, all of these techniques every morning and night for a month so they can become an automatic part of your thinking to help you not only form your future identity but create your ideal life. These could just be the ten most important minutes of your daily life.

***Join me for more on this subject tomorrow, Tuesday, April 16th at 11am PT/2pm ET for Facebook Live on my Facebook Biz Page: Coach Michelle Weimer.