Make a Change – It’s all in the mind
Posted by Ben Lumley on May 19, 2010 in Success, Thinking Differently | 17 comments
“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.” Albert Einstein
One of the traits of any consistently successful person is their ability to imagine the finishing line, even when they have no comprehension of what it actually looks like. We all have this same ability, it’s just that not all of us know how to activate it or why it works. If you can see your goal, you can make it happen.
Colour. Colour. Colour.
Why is this important though? Well, let me tell you a little story. When I bought my car four years ago, I went to the garage forecourt knowing what I wanted. When I got there I saw one particular car that really stood out from the crowd. I knew that that was the one I wanted (providing it was in good condition). I liked it because the colour was really unique and made it look really smart. I’d never seen this particular car in that colour before.
That was until I drove it off the lot two hours later. I must have seen three or four on the way home and within a week I’d seen over 50! Why? Because I’d started focusing on that car, in that colour. I’d activated my RAS (Reticular Activating System) and it was locking on to everything it could find that matched my car. That ever happen to you? One minute you start thinking about something and within minutes you’re finding things that are exactly the same.
Info overload!
The problem your brain has is that on a daily basis there’s too much information to contend with on a concious level. Think about it. If you consciously took in absolutely everything around you, how long do you think it would be before you went crazy? Not long most likely. That’s because the wonderful brain you have inside your head doesn’t need to focus on everything, it only needs to take in information about things that are relevant to you and your environment.
Many of us never consciously, actively, activate our RAS and so never use it to it’s fullest potential. By being able to imagine your end goal, your RAS is able to actively seek out things in your life to help to confirm it and make it happen. Maybe that’s weird for some, but it’s how it all works.
Why not check out this post I wrote over at theinfopreneur.net about the RAS and the subconscious mind?
Visualisation
The power of visualisation is something many people never get the chance to experience. As a company, it’s something we try to do in as many motivational workshops with young people as we can because it’s such a good exercise and they always love doing it.
Visualisation is very simple. All you have to do is imagine yourself achieving your goal or goals in crystal clear detail. The more detail about colours, sights, sounds, smells, textures and so on that you can think of, the more powerful the experience will be. This exercise can be done in many different forms from a more structured exercise to thinking in detail about your future success while standing in line for the bus!
If you’re currently studying for an exam, or will be in the near future, check out our visualisation exercise on YouTube.
Untapped potential
You have this amazing resource that, if you set it to work for you, will actually help create the future you’ve been dreaming about. But this isn’t some magic trick that means you can sit on your ass and do nothing while the success comes rolling in. You still need to take massive action to realise the goals you’ve set yourself; visualisation simply helps the whole process along.
Similar Posts:
- Make a change: The Power of Setting Goals
- Make a Change – Start taking action now.
- Make a change – Get Motivated
- What I’m Going To Do About Being A First-Time Dad
- The Keys to Unlocking Success: Part 6 Learning from Life
Ben Lumley writes about Success and Personal Achievement at 6aliens.com. He is a Personal Achievement Coach and Motivational Speaker.
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Your experience with the car is so true. I’m standing (about to rush off and do something useful!) here laughing to myself. The exact same thing happened to me. We have a funny shaped car, it looks weird! But it suits the requirements of our troop perfectly. Until I started thinking about getting one, I’d never seen one before, ever. But then they started appearing everywhere. Weird! The same thing happens with babies. I remember every time I was pregnant, for nine months, I’d see pregnant ladies everywhere. Never knew why until today so thanks for that
And your description of imagining the end result and the power of that sounds like something I’ve heard Paul McKenna say in relation to weight loss. Seems these things have many applications.
Great post, thanks Ben
(Love the picture too btw)
Thanks El
It’s a curious phenomenon but a very powerful one. Its even more powerful when we don’t realise the negative focus we have
Ooooh, I hadn’t flipped the context. Does that mean that if we think about yucky stuff, our wonderful brains start looking for ways to make that happen?! Daunting
Yes, I see pregnant ladies everywhere too! Mind you it could have something to do with the time of the year!
One month to go today!
It has everything to do with the time of year for you personally. There are no more pregnant ladies hanging around right now than there were 8 months ago. You’ve just proven Ben’s RAS thing is true.
Oooh, if your little one arrives slightly early, you could be a daddy before I get back from France! Trust all goes well and sending lots of love in case you have an early arrival
x
I like the story about the cars. That’s so true.
When I bought my last car, I had a very unusual shade of silver, I loved it, it looked stunning!
Shame it’s sold though to make way for the little one!
Your last car was rather nice Matthew!
Hey Ben, this is a nice post. I have that experience with cars as well. Usually when I’m driving, I don’t pay attention to colors of the cars next to me or the brand of the cars either. But sometimes while I’m driving, I’ll focus on one brand of cars and suddenly I realize how many there are on the road. We’re lucky that our brains don’t focus at everything at once or we might go insane. I think that just makes us think or wonder about the full potential of our minds. Great post Ben. Thank you.
Thanks Hulbert
Can you imagine the info overload if your mind took in everything you saw and experience in somewhere like a forest?
Hi Ben,
how are you?
thanks for sharing this article and for shedding more light on RAS.
Take care and enjoy the rest of the day
Thanks Ayo
I’m glad you enjoyed it
I’m very well thank you – how are you?
Hi Ben,
Love this topic! I use therapeutic imagery in hypnotherapy and it elicits much useful information when a client is exploring the subconscious mind.
There is literally millions of bits of information that is presented to us in any given moment. In order to handle the information, the mind must filter through the information somewhat similar to searching the internet using keywords.
In your case, the car that you purchased was entered in your ’search field’ and you received over 50 results.
What you focus on expands
Thanks for the great post!
Thanks Kim
The filter we all have is really important isn’t it? The great thing is that we can change that filter
Hi Ben,
What you describe is an essential part of learning.
Math, music, science, language, and even sports – all of these are taught by repetition, and then eventually, the recognition (and use of) of patterns.
This can also cause many negative things in one’s life. For example, how often do you hear people talk about Murphy’s law or the fact that some rather mundane part of life NEVER works (even if it has 40,000 times out of the 45,000 times they have performed that task)?
We have to learn to use this in a positive way and fight off the negativity.
Nice post. Have a great day!
Fighting off negativity is spot on Mark
Great to see you here!
Imagination and visualization are indeed two powerful tools that can help us stay motivated and provide us with the specific steps we need to take. I’m not a visual person, and I believe that in terms of the said activities, this somehow gives an advantage as I am not entirely influenced by what I see.
I think we all are influenced subconciously by the visual around us as well as what we hear and so on. We all just filter that information in different ways. You clearly have a visual reduced filter.