Using Visualisation Properly To Help You!

SOUL TV EPISODE 196

Using Visualisation Properly To Help You! How do you use visualization properly? Visualization gets positioned as a way to help us create success and kick goals so what is it and how do we do it so that it works for us? Watch 8pm Mon 24 Aug.

What is visualisation? For us it is one of our internal representation systems. It is one of the ways we, Paul and I, naturally create and manifest our reality and what we would like in our world. What we don’t want can be manifested as well just as strongly so it is wise to know what you want and then work on visualising that. Not what you don’t want. In the same way you would watch what you are thinking in order not to bring through negativity, it is even more important to be aware of what you are visualising. The trick then is to begin to master visualisation and to use it with volition to create the world you want because it is a really powerful force.

Both Paul and I visualise differently. For me Phoebe it is easy to “see” pictures in my mind’s eye of how I want things to be and how they can be e.g. renovating a house or building or creating something. I can see the finished product and the stages along the way, in full colour etc. Whereas Paul would see it better if he could find a picture that represents what it would look like. You can also visualise anything you want to bring into your life from work to play. Fact is most people visualise constantly without even being aware of what they are doing. Some just find it harder to create a mental picture on demand or to understanding that they are “seeing”.

Creative visualisation is different from normal visualisation because you are using it for a specific purpose with a specific outcome in mind. For example a dress you wish to make for a party, or a painting you have in mind to create. Remember also that nothing can be brought into the physical realm without it being thought of first. For example if you want to make a chair you must first think of what it would look like and then you can create it. It must go through that creative visualisation stage first. Whether you can “see” it without having to find an example of something similar to look at you still have to “see” it in your mind first. Seeing it for some may be more of a feeling, a smell, a sound etc of what it would look like rather than an actual 3D image. How does a vision impaired person “see” something? Just because it would look different to a sighted person in their minds doesn’t mean it is not a full picture. We all use our personal acuity whether it be visual, kinaesthetic (feeling), auditory, gustatory, (taste), Olfactory, (smell) to create an internal representation of what we want. A combination of all of these helps to create the full picture. You would use all these factors to make it as real as possible in your mind and then it can be brought into the physical reality more by either writing it down, drawing it, pasting pictures of what it will look like on a board, (vision boarding) firstly. It is a really important step because it takes it from the realm of the mind into our physical reality. For example this is how all art is produced.

There was a French painter sitting under a tree staring off into space and his neighbour looked over the fence and said to him, “I see you are relaxing!” and the painter said,” No I am working!” A couple of days later the neighbour saw the painter out in his backyard painting. He said to him, “I see you are working!” “No!” he replied, “I am relaxing.”

Visualising sets you up for outcomes you wish to achieve. The more you rehearse it in your mind with all the emotions, the feelings, the sights, the sounds, the smells etc, etc, the more likely it is that it will be achieved in physical form. When the outcome you have visualised happens in reality it is because you have changed your subconscious belief about the outcome. For example when a person sees themselves in the first person completing a task they would normally find hard….whatever that task is, be it an athlete, a musician or a public speaker, then you have created new neural pathways in your brain. Even if people visualise themselves training in a gym rather than physically doing it, it can still have a result. Some quite impressive. That is the power of the mind. Because the mind most of the time doesn’t know the difference between reality and imagination if you see it strongly enough on ALL levels or as many as you possibly can. In fact you can recreate a whole traumatic or amazing scenario for yourself with all the accompanying physical, mental and emotional experiences, just by visualising it. That would be a good time to use positive visualisation to move beyond the experience and create a positive reaction rather than a negative one. If you find you are constantly recreating negative experiences this is when it is a good time to seek professional help to move you beyond your normal response. For example with hypnosis you can move a person beyond their phobias, which is just a sensory loop, a film if you will that is played over and over again when confronted or thinking about a similar situation. That is when, with professional help, a person can be moved into a positive response. Same with anxiety and depression. Especially with anxiety as people are projecting (visualising) what MIGHT happen, so they have something to worry about.

If you have trouble visualising then we would guide people to go to their emotions and build a “picture” that way. What does it “feel” like, What would it sound like, are there any specific colours that would come, does it have a smell to it, would it have a taste, What would you say to yourself to describe it once it would be in the physical. Do a vision board that would cover all the sensations of your outcome that you cannot visualise in your mind clearly enough.

For most people, if you stop long enough, you will realise that you have been constantly guided by “pictures” i.e impulses. What happens first when you think of the ice cream in the fridge. More often than not you will get a picture of it before you get up and go get it. Based on your acuity, you will either smell it, taste it, feel it etc….whatever it is, however you “See”, more often than not it is enough to get you to act on it. So we can “see” our lives as a series of “pictures” and impulses. The trick is to use these pictures and impulses constructively.

So now go out and impulse and picture yourselves into the life you want.

Paul and Phoebe Hoogendy.