A Beginner’s Guide and Practical Approach to the Process of Visualization

The power of visualization… It’s what athletes know — creating the zone before being in it.  It’s how the most convincing and compelling actors do it — taking us on an emotional journey and cause us to suspend our beliefs about reality.

But how can you take practical steps to employ visualization in your life and make it work for you toward achieving your goals?  This article will give you an overview of what visualization is and how to harness its power in your own life.

What Exactly is Creative Visualization

Creative visualization is using the mind as a tool to create a scenario, scene, and/or setting that you can see with the eyes closed, and experience on every other sensory level, such as smell, touch, taste, hear and even experience sequences of events as you want them to occur.

It is having a full-on experience before the actual experience.  It’s exploring every aspect of a desired scenario or lifestyle down to the finest details.  What million-dollar scenarios would you like to experience?  Our first tip is, THINK BIG.  For example, these might be some scenarios you can try — you might just be surprised how the universe rises up and exceeds your expectations:

• Private jet getaway experience.  Where are you being whisked away at the drop of a hat?  Who and what will be waiting for you on the plane?  Once you arrive?  How will you spend your time while you are there or will you stay forever? 
• Surprising a loved one with a gift beyond their wildest dreams.  What is it?  Who is it for?  How does it make you feel to be able to give it to them?
• Owning a successful business.  What kind of business can you visualize owning?  Could it be a bottling company with your own branded drink? Could your drink be the next Coca Cola? Or maybe you want to own major league sports team? A taco truck? A laundromat? A nail salon? A restaurant?  A real estate investment company specializing in the production of skyscrapers? The sky’s the limit if you let your imagination work!

Visualization elicits emotions.  Do not struggle with these emotions if they feel bad.  Basically, don’t feel bad for feeling bad.  This is normal.  Noticing the absence of what you want that is not there yet is normal.  Notice the negative emotions but don’t struggle with them.  Let them pass by as a cloud in the sky of your mind.  The tools presented here will help you forget these emotions as you move through and repeat each process regularly, but first…

How Powerful is Visualization

A study on the effect of visualization on the Olympic performance of Soviet athletes revealed that the ones who devoted 75% of their training time to visualization outperformed control groups of athletes that allocated 0%, 25%, and even up to 50% of their time to visualization.  The results of this study have tremendous implications for what it means to take effective action and how time should be spent toward reaching a goal.  The evidence shows that a critical element of achieving a goal is mental preparation–or in other words, creative visualization.

Preparing the mind for action is key.  The mind simply responds to the stimuli you give it via sensory input.  The mind cannot distinguish what is real from what is imagined.  This is the reason that dreams often feel completely real.  And this is the reason your imagination is your most powerful ally on your path to achieving your dreams and having a sense of purpose and personal fulfillment in your life

If you think about it, it makes perfect sense.  The brain automatically stores memories of the past, good or bad, and when we recall them, we take it for granted that these were real events even though they exist only in our mind and sometimes experience the emotions all over again as if they were happening now. 

Although it takes a conscious effort, we can train our brain to believe in future events that have not occurred, thereby pre-paving the way to their manifestation and occurrence.  Not to be confused with prospective memory (for example, when you write yourself a note on the refrigerator not to forget to pick up milk at the grocery)  think of the act of visualizing your future event as creating a “memory forward” or a “future memory” that you not only intend to experience but also for which you are already giving yourself the emotional reward here and now. 

A little trick you can use to jumpstart your visualization is to say to yourself out loud  ”Remember the time when [insert future desired outcome or experience here].”  And then reinforce it with an affirmative statement “Yes, it was so amazing because it made me feel [insert the state of your emotions after having made this dream come true].” Attaching your experience to emotion is key!

How to Start Visualizing

You may be saying to yourself, “I think I know how to visualize, but how do I make sure I’m doing it right in order to get the outcome that I want?”  We’re going to go beyond imagining still objects in space as the goal of visualization. We’re giving you a step-by-step guide to visualization and clear instructions on just how to go about entering the creative workshop of the mind to make a desired outcome real. 

1. Set the stage.  Choose an environment that allows you to be totally present and focused on yourself, whether that is completely quiet, or with some ambient white noise, like your favorite cafe or lunch spot.  Visualization can be done anywhere, but choose a place where you will not be disturbed for at least fifteen minutes. If you have the luxury of doing this process at home, light a candle.  Find a picture of someone you love… a family member, a good friend who makes you laugh, ideally someone who loves you unconditionally or create one in your imagination to stimulate good feelings.
2. In addition to a specific goal, write down the scenario.  Goals can be short-term, long-term, unspoken, or explicit.  But it’s usually not the material reward that is the end target.  Our true ambition is the emotional state we will feel once we cross the finish line.  Creating a scenario that incorporates all of the five senses AND a series of events in our mind allows us to emote better and experience the state of being which corresponds to the actions along the way that are most likely to lead to the desired outcome.  To further increase the power of visualization, write down what these various sensations of achieving the goal will feel like from every aspect.   What will the perfect situation look like, smell like, taste like, feel like, and sound like? Who will be there?  When will it occur?  Creating every detail in the workshop of the mind is the first step to turning mere thoughts, which at first are simply electrical impulses in the brain, into reality.
3. Place yourself in the scenario.­  Rather than focus on the object, thing, or outcome in your scenario, watch yourself like a movie.  What will you be wearing?  What will you say?  Where will you be?  With whom will you be interacting? Observe yourself in the situation as if you were observing and actor on screen.

NOTE: Many times it’s easy for us to see someone else in a scenario because of what we’ve been conditioned to believe about our own worthiness.  Acknowledge any emotions this brings up, but do not resist.  Say to yourself, “This emotion has been given to me from the outside, but it’s not how I really feel and what I really know is possible and true for me.  I am worthy just as I am.”  These kinds of affirmations are wonderful to do in front of a mirror at least once daily.

1. Use your own voice.  Literally. After you’ve fully fleshed out your goal complete with the winning scenario, use your computer or smart phone to record what you’ve written in your own voice.  Do not infuse the recording with false enthusiasm.  Your brain can detect dishonesty in the tone of voice.  The key is to speak with firm intention.  Listen to your recording during your visualization sessions.  Re-record the scenario if you feel it needs to be updated or spoken more firmly.  Each time you will be giving your  thoughts and words more power.  Indeed you will have now taken your thoughts, turned them into words, spoken them aloud, and listened to them, as they have been given form in the voice of your own mind.
2. Finally, meditate on the emotion and let the details go.   After you’ve completed the exercise of visualization, clear the mind or focus on something else.  If you are not in a setting where you can meditate, play some calming music and just breathe, try distracting your mind by reading a magazine article on a topic  you enjoy.  Take your focus away from the effort of visualizing.  Turn the thoughts you have created into memories that you can access at anytime and immediately recall and experience the emotions they bring you.

So, up to this point external factors may have dominated your attitude toward life and you may have found yourself blindly reacting to the world around you and the people in it.  Use visualization to shift this reactive approach to your day to one that is proactive and internally driven to take initiative.

Be assured that the majority of people, including the extremely successful individuals, were not lucky enough in every stage of life to experience consistently happy or positive events with enough frequency to leave them bubbling over with self-esteem, courage in the face of adversity, grace under fire and spontaneous charisma.  But for that reason we must not rely external stimuli for motivation. Be also assured that one their most relied upon tools is visualization. The wonderful part of being a free adult individual is that what we were not given, we can give to ourselves.  And we can bring this about through the powerful process of visualization.

Your first assignment using the steps above:  Imagine your perfect day.

Your next assignment:  Go out and live it!