Think Results NOW: You Are What You Think book 1 – #10: Use Mental Images To Remodel Yourself

You Are What You Think book 1

Article #10

My life is an Excellent Adventure from using “You Are What You Think”

Use Mental Images To Remodel Yourself

WE ALL MAKE resolutions and fail to keep them. Each time we fail it makes the next failure easier, because we are establishing a failure pattern.

This failure pattern must be transformed into a success pattern before we can expect to overcome deeply engrained habits.

Human nature can’t have changed much throughout the years. The methods of overcoming habits and establishing new ones were taught thousands of years ago and they haven’t changed. It was recognized then that before a person could make a change in his life his mind must be prepared for it.

A FIGHTER TRAINS for months before a big fight. Professional athletes train for weeks before a season. Why should we expect to be able to change lifelong habits without preparation ?

In order to set up a success pattern we should start with easily achieved goals. In starting an exercise program don’t tell yourself you will do 50 sit-ups and 50 push-ups every day. Much better to say you will do five of each and do them rather than say you are going to do 50 and do 40.

As far as your subconscious mind was concerned, you failed when you did 40 and succeeded when you did five. Soon it becomes automatic for you to exercise daily. A success pattern is now established.

ONCE STARTED, you cannot permit yourself the luxury of a single failure, or exception. It is like winding a ball of string. One slip and the whole ball becomes unwound ! This explains many of our past failures.

Last week we mentioned the Natural Law of visualization, or the making of mental images.

If you were to remodel a room in your home, you would first picture it the way it would be when the remodeling job was completed.

USE THE SAME method to remodel yourself ! Make your picture clear and distinct, and firmly imprinted on your mind. Then begin to build around it.

Let your thoughts dwell upon the mental picture. Let your imagination see your self as possessed of the desired trait and then ACT IT OUT.

I was explaining the laws of visualization to the convicts at Folsom Prison one day. A short time later these laws were proven right before our eyes.

TO GET A LAUGH, one of the men said, “Why don’t you use this principle to make a great public speaker out of Eugene ?”

Of all the people I have known, Eugene would have to be the least likely to become a public speaker. He was so shy and withdrawn I had never heard him make a single comment.

Naturally, the men got a big laugh out of the idea of his becoming a great speaker.

EUGENE CAME into the room a few minutes later, I called him aside.

“I would like you to participate in an experiment for the benefit of the rest of the group,” I told him. “I want you to sit down and try to assume the feeling you would have if you were one of the most famous public speakers in the country. Mentally picture yourself giving a talk and receiving a standing ovation.”

He sat down without saying a word, and we went on to another subject. Occasionally I glanced his way and imagined I could see a change coming over him.

ABOUT HALF AN hour went by, and then suddenly Eugene arose from his chair and actually swaggered to the lectern. He gently pushed me aside, faced the group, and commenced speaking !

For the next few minutes he had everyone enthralled. The other convicts were listening with their mouths open in astonishment, and some had tears in their eyes.

None of them had heard this man speak to any extent before, and here he was giving one of the finest talks any of us had ever heard. He marched triumphantly back to his seat, never to be the same again ! The men gave him a standing ovation, just as he had visualized !

THIS PRINCIPLE is also extremely effective in helping one get through unpleasant situations. It is done by making a mental picture of yourself in the situation, and seeing yourself reacting to it calmly and in complete control of yourself.

Do this frequently until a strong impression is made, so that when the unpleasant situation actually does occur, you will automatically react in the way you pictured yourself reacting.

You will be surprised how less frequently unpleasant situations arise in your life as soon as you learn how to control your reaction to them.

ONE LAST THOUGHT about habits, both the breaking and the acquiring of them:

If we often flinch from making an effort, before we know it the effort-making capacity is gone.