As children, most of us had vivid imaginations. I know I did. I played for hours with imaginary friends pretending to cook, clean, build; and we took infinite adventures to faraway places that were mysterious and exciting. As I grew into a pre-teen, I still fantasized a lot about what I would grow up to become and what it might be like to live in faraway countries. Of course, as a teenager all I could think about was boys, boys, boys, and as I started college it was a time of parties, frolic and fun. By the time I took my first serious job, I had basically forgotten all about my imagination. After all, it was time be an adult and get serious about life. What a mistake that was!
After nearly 40 years in the workforce, three marriages, and one 12-year-old child, I recently came to a new awareness. Now, I truly value my imagination for what it provides. Spending time ‘day dreaming’, fantasizing, and imagining is a far cry from wasting time. For many years I disregarded my imagination as frivolous. I could not have been further from the truth.
Today I highly recommend spending 5-20 minutes daily playing in your imagination. Allowing your mind to create new and exciting possibilities is not only healthy, but imperative for future change to occur. Most people spend inordinate amounts of time dwelling on their current situation be it their health, living space, relationships, bodyweight or any number of things because ‘it is what is’ and it is happening this red hot minute. I say, “Who cares?” and “When did focusing on unwanted things ever bring you what you want anyway?” As counter intuitive as it may feel, imagining life different from ‘what is’ is the only way I have found to successfully create something different. As challenging as this is, it is the ONLY way to release the old and open doors for the new to come in.
It doesn’t matter how sick you are, how broke you are, how overweight you are, or how unhappy you are in your current job or relationship, IF YOU WANT IT TO CHANGE, YOU HAVE TO START IMAGINING IT CHANGED! Set aside 5 minutes before you even get out of bed each morning and 5 minutes every night before you drift off to sleep and imagine whatever you wish to be different as different. Turn up the colors, volume, fragrances, and most of all, allow yourself to feel how good you feel as though you have achieved whatever it is you desire. Stay in that wonderful feeling for as long as you can, milk it, savor it and return to that feeling as often as you can remember to do so. I can promise you that if you commit to this practice for the next 30 days, there will be positive change in your life.
There are many scientific studies in the process of proving the power we wield with our thoughts. But even more amazing are the connections being made between our heartfelt emotions and outcomes. In other words, we cannot go around 24/7 talking about our disease, worrying about it, researching it and basically identifying as that disease, and move toward health. The same is true of excess body weight. If you spend the majority of your day dwelling on how unhappy you are about your weight, how you have had this issue forever and a day, how everyone in your family has it and on and on you go, guess what, you aren’t going to be able to lose weight.
Decide that you are going to be a focused thinker and you are going to spend time contemplating on all the things you imagine in your mind’s eye that excite you, lift your spirits, bring a smile to your face and are generally wonderful to imagine. Give up harping on what you don’t want and become proactive in your mind. Start there and it won’t be long before circumstances and events will begin to change. When that happens, it will support the direction of your new focus. Happy fitness
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