Often we focus more on what we’re missing than on what we truly want. Visualization can help you train your mind and make room for your deepest desires. Joseph Murphy, known for ‘The Power of Your Subconscious Mind‘, says that our beliefs and thoughts shape our reality. It’s about focusing on what you want to achieve, as if it’s already happening.
The Power of Visualization
But how do you speak to your subconscious mind?
And how does visualizing your desires help against negative thoughts?
Michelangelo once said: “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” He saw the image already in the block of marble. Through his imagination, he was able to create something extraordinary. It’s the same with visualization: you immerse yourself in the experience of achieving your goals. This activates your cognitive abilities to help you reach those goals. So it’s important to visualize what you want.
An Example of Creative Visualization
Imagine this: a woman living in the city dreams of a quiet village where she writes a novel. She sees herself at a wooden desk with a cup of coffee, typing the final pages. The sun shines through the window and she hears the sound of a dove. Outside is a serene lake. She thinks about going kayaking later. She feels satisfied and calm. By reliving this image repeatedly, her subconscious mind begins to believe it’s real.
It’s as if you’re really there. And because you experience this over and over, your subconscious mind sees it as reality.
The Power of the Subconscious
The emotions you feel during visualization are comparable to what you would feel in reality. By repeating this, it penetrates your subconscious mind. This creates opportunities to achieve your goal. It can even happen that situations develop in ways that help you. For example, the woman who dreams of the village might unexpectedly receive a call from an old friend who lives there. That friend invites her, which perfectly aligns with her dream.
The Reality of Visualization
Your subconscious mind doesn’t distinguish between what’s real and what you imagine. The emotions and feelings you experience during visualization are just as real. Joseph Murphy explains that your brain consists of a conscious and a subconscious mind.
Your conscious mind creates emotions that determine your behavior and choices. Your subconscious mind lies beneath and sees no difference between fantasy and reality. It takes the input from your conscious mind and triggers the same emotions.
Imagination as Reality
Your subconscious mind accepts everything your conscious mind ‘feeds’ it as truth. So when you visualize a scene, your subconscious feels as if you’re really there. It’s as if you’re actually experiencing the situation, with all its emotions.
Your mind tends to reinforce your beliefs. This causes you to attract situations and environments that match your beliefs. Your attention naturally goes to things that matter to you. It’s a kind of attraction.
Now that we know this, we can look at different visualization techniques you can use to realize your desires. Which methods are effective? Below are a few techniques recommended by experts like Joseph Murphy.
Visualization Techniques in Practice
The First Technique: Meditation
The first technique is meditation. During meditation, you focus on the situation you want to achieve. Dr. Wayne Dyer, a renowned author in the field of personal development, emphasizes that your thoughts determine what happens to you. If you want to change your life, you must train your mind.
He says you must constantly immerse yourself in the environment you want to create. The Wright brothers didn’t think about the limitations of flying, and Thomas Edison didn’t focus on the challenges. They had a clear vision, which motivated them to achieve their goals.
The Second Technique: Affirmations
Another technique is meditating on a single word or affirmation. It’s a simple technique. You formulate a short sentence that summarizes your desire. For example, if you want to become a famous writer, you can say: “I am an internationally recognized author.” Write this on a card and focus on it for a few minutes every morning. After a while, this sentence will become anchored in your subconscious mind.
The Third Technique: Mental Movie
The third visualization technique is the ‘mental movie’. Joseph Murphy discusses this approach extensively in his book. A famous Chinese proverb says: a picture is worth a thousand words. William James, a pioneer in psychology, said that your subconscious mind can turn mental images into reality if you just believe in them. With this technique, you create a kind of cinema in your head.
You imagine a scene in which you achieve your goal, or how you want to achieve it. You replay this scene over and over in your mind, with strong emotions, as if it’s really happening. If you do this well and immerse yourself in this scene with the right emotions, your life will develop so that you enter the reality you’ve imagined.
The Fourth Technique: Vision Board
The fourth technique is using a Vision Board. This helps you see your dreams and goals clearly and imprint them in your mind. On a poster board, you paste images, symbols, and sentences from magazines. Use your imagination and think about everything you want to achieve, from a vacation in Italy to completing a project.
Hang this board in a place where you see it every day, for example supplemented with affirmations. This constant exposure spontaneously triggers visualizations of your desires.
The Do’s and the Don’ts
It works like this: negative thoughts and uncertainties like “things will only get worse“, “I can’t find a solution“, or “all is lost“, can sabotage your success if you keep repeating them with intense emotions. You must reject these negative thoughts about yourself and your goals and not pay attention to them. Try to quickly neutralize such negativity when it arises.
For example, if you think “I’m not smart“, you must immediately interrupt this and replace it with “I am intelligent“. You must truly believe what you say, otherwise it won’t work. Dare to believe that you deserve success, then your subconscious will respect you. If you have problems, it means your subconscious doubts your right to your desires.
Before you pursue your goals, you must believe that you deserve abundance. This belief causes you to attract your goals.
