“If my mind can conceive it, and my heart can believe it, then I can achieve it.”, a very famous quote by the great Muhammad Ali, and time to time we hear from many famous people that they bought their desires into reality by manifesting it through their visions and affirmations. So, what is manifestation? It is putting something into our physical reality through our thoughts, feelings, and beliefs. To conceive something in our mind we need to see it with clarity too through the eyes of our mind, and this process of generating mental imagery is called creative visualization. It is a way to stimulate or recreate a visual perception.
Visualization or mental rehearsal in sports is a great tool shared not only by great athletes or high performing people but most of us in our lives, be it personal or professional. Our brain is the master of our body but still most of the time we work hard neck down and forget that it all starts from our brain and the mind residing in it. What is the mind? It is the manifestation of thoughts, perception, emotion, determination, memory, and imagination that takes place within the brain.
I see this tool as a powerful way to increase my mental strength and push me toward achieving something. It drives my motivation and helps build self-confidence and determination in me.
So, is it all? We just need to create a mental image. NO!
A very important aspect of using creative visualization for manifesting our desired results is the feelings and beliefs associated with it. So, it is very important to see, feel, and believe. It is like drawing your favourite piece of art on a blank paper.
My way to Visualization
My way is quite simple, firstly I create the ambience of the room with the fragrance of essential oil to relax and support a clear vision of what I want to manifest. Let’s say, I want to win a match against the best player in the club. Now, I sit on a chair or the ground with a straight spine and eyes closed. I begin with deep breathing to calm my thoughts and focus to visualize and feel everything, even the little details from start to finish including the weather, colours, lines, my excitement and nervousness, everything that happens on a match day. I see myself entering the club and going through a ritual of warm-up before entering the court, then starting on-court warmup and finally playing the match. I envision myself hitting the ball with good positions, stances, racquet preparation and execution on the shots; moving around the court; following the ball trajectory and the location of my shots landing on the other side. While I am playing this match in my mind, I create the strategies to win points and recreate the situations which were hard to win – i.e. my opponent playing his best. It allows me to experience point play under pressure and replay the points from the past, the only difference in this mental rehearsal is I see myself winning those points and eventually the match at the end. I also feel the joy of winning the match and at last, once I am finished, I slowly open my eyes.
You can use this tool on daily basis for practice sessions where you are specifically working on a technique or tactic, or for anything else that you want in your life.
Affirmations to support your visualization
Visualization is also incomplete without mentioning positive affirmations because an element of how this tool works is the essence of the things taking place now and here. Using affirmations (short, powerful statements used in a positive way to consciously influence your thoughts) will enhance your visualization. It may feel senseless to do affirmations out loud if you are not feeling it, but what we speak we make it real. Just like when you visualize you create energy through a mental image with all its sensations, emotions, and feelings, you can also create higher vibes with the words you speak out loud. For affirmations be mindful of using positive words.
Expectations
Lastly, have expectations. After all, there is no point in visualizing and not expecting the results. But don’t expect results to show up with you not putting any action. It will also depend on your perseverance to change your actions to support new habits to achieve your manifestation as it will require a new habit of thought, belief, and action. It is like updating your phones and computers to a new operating system where hardware doesn’t change but the software is all-new for better device performance. Time to time your trust and faith will be tested but if you keep a check on your actions and habits to align with your manifestation, it will ultimately happen. Remember, our actions become our habits and those habits become who we are.
To summarize, achieving something through the practice of visualization you need the following steps:
- Write precisely about what you want.
- Describe your vision in detail.
- Start to visualize, create emotions and feelings associated and do affirmations to boost your vision.
- Take daily actions to bring your vision to the physical world.
- Have courage and persist to achieve it.
Now go on, to practice this tool and play your best game with your toughest opponent in your mind and bring out the best of you.
Written By – Sonaal Asthana, Junior Development Coach @ Future Demand Tennis