Unlock Your Imagination, Unlock Your Success

Did you know you can succeed, with more speed and less stress, by using your imagination?

“One’s ability to imagine is directly proportional to one’s ability to be successful.” — L. Ron Hubbard (Self Analysis, Chapter 8)

Let’s break this down.

Ability: Something you can do; one of your skills or powers. You can constantly improve imagination power.

Imagine: You create mental images with perceptions. The more vivid you make these pictures, the more likely you turn them into reality.

Proportionate: The relationship between two or more things of a whole. If you increase one of the parts, the other part automatically increases.

So if you double your ability to imagine, you double your ability to succeed.

How Does Your Ability to Imagine Help You Succeed?

Everything starts in someone’s imagination. The Egyptian pyramids started in someone’s imagination. Electricity, computers and AI started as an imagination. Every billionaire first imagined being filthy rich before he or she made their first million.

It’s not magical. Success doesn’t come from wishing. It comes from imagining and acting.

If you use the power of your imagination to succeed, the following happens.

  1. You create a detailed, vivid image of what you want. It fires you up.
  2. You see a path and the steps to achieve it.
  3. You take responsibility for getting the steps done.
  4. You take the steps.
  5. You succeed.

Two Examples

Example #1: Shelly and Jill Want Homes

Shelly and Jill are sisters who both want to buy homes—but only one uses imagination.

Jill focuses on problems. She panics about mortgage rates and blames the economy.

Shelly imagines her future home in detail—floor plans, neighborhoods, prices. She collects tips, studies loan options and knows what she can afford.

When they see a perfect house ad, Jill says, “I probably can’t afford it. Why bother?”

Shelly says, “That’s my dream house! I’ll go see it on my lunch break.”

Who do you think will succeed?

Example #2: Major James Nesmeth’s Golf Practice

While serving in Vietnam, U.S. Air Force Major James Nesmeth was captured and held in a tiny prison cell for seven years.

To stay sane, he used his imagination. Every day, he mentally played a round of golf at his favorite course. He imagined the sights, sounds, and feel of each swing for all 18 holes.

When he was finally released, Nesmeth was in poor physical shape. But when he returned to the golf course, his game improved by 20 strokes. All thanks to years of vivid, focused imagination.

How Good is Your Imagination? (Five Levels)

Your imagination can be really bad, incredibly good or somewhere in the middle. Here are five examples:

1. Negative Imagination

You ruin your future with bad thoughts. You see a future with pain and suffering for you or others. You do not control your imagination – it controls you.

Just by imagining bad things will happen to you, you feel horrible. Your imagination ruins your success. “I’m going to have a bad life.” “People like me just can’t get ahead.”

If you imagine bad things happening others, you also ruin your success. “She’s going to have a bad life.” “He’ll realize how wrong he is.”

2. No Imagination

You cannot imagine your life will ever improve. You only see it as it is now.

“This is just how it is. Nothing will change.”

As a result, you do not succeed.

3. Weak Imagination

Your imagination is made up of wishes and fuzzy images for the future.

“I just wish/pray/hope that I’ll just suddenly be rich.” “I just hope I get lucky.”

Unless you take responsibility, you probably never succeed.

4. Good Imagination

You create and see clear, specific mental pictures of actual goals and results. You have a good idea of how you will make your success happen.

“I see myself running a profitable business that helps people.” “I imagine today will be a great day because I see myself working twice as hard.”

As a result, you succeed more often than not.

5. Powerful Imagination

You have developed an inventive, creative imagination. You use it to solve major problems, accomplish big goals and make brilliant discoveries.

You imagine new solutions, create new systems and see opportunities that others can’t see. You also know the steps to make your objectives succeed.

You are focused and responsible. You don’t wait for the world to bring success to you.

“Not only will I succeed, I’ll invent a whole new way to do it, and I’ll help others succeed too.” “I know there’s a way to earn millions, and I have a good plan to find it.”

As a result, you cause rapid growth and major successes.

You invent the future and succeed!

Ten Ways to Succeed with Your Imagination

1. Daily Success
a. Use it to get out of bed. Before you pull off the covers, imagine your day. If your body wants to stay in bad, imagine a little movie of just getting up and going.
b. Boost your mood. Look at the Tone Scale and pick the tone you want, and then imagine being at that tone until you feel it.

2. Improve Your Life
a. Make a bad condition less stressful or even into a good condition. For example, you are sitting in a jail cell with nothing to do. You close your eyes and imagine you are relaxing on a beach, enjoying a movie or climbing up a mountain.
b. Use your imagination to change negative thoughts to positive thoughts. For example, you watch so much news about travel risks that you are afraid to travel. So you stop watching the news and imagine enjoying a safe, interesting trip. You keep using your imagination for this trip until the news pollution is gone and you’re excited to travel.
c. Change your past. When a past memory is affecting you, change that memory. Instead of suffering from a financial, business or personal loss, imagine it was a helpful lesson.

3. Increase Your Work Success
a. Make yourself into a better work performer. See yourself being motivated, enthusiastic, efficient, courageous, smart, productive, etc.
b. Prepare for difficult tasks to boost your success with those tasks. Imagine an awesome end result, the steps you need to take, how to start, how to conduct yourself and all other details. For example, you imagine yourself handling a mountain of paperwork in one day. You soon have a clean desk.

4. Increase Your Income
a. Create something incredible.
b. Imagine being an artist, designer, singer, writer or whoever you want to be. Now imagine doing the work and creating something amazing. Finally, imagine other people enjoying your creation.

5. Improve Your Health
a. Sleep better. Imagine a deep sleep, pleasant thoughts and comfort. Imagine waking up feeling rested and energized. Continue until you fall asleep.
b. Exercise more often. See yourself enjoying your favorite exercise or physical activity. Imagine the details until you are ready to go for it.
c. Improve your diet. Watch your future self losing interest in junk food. Create images of delicious healthy food and watch yourself enjoy this food until you are hungry. Then go eat!
d. If you get ill, imagine the end of the illness. See yourself not suffering and actually enjoying your recovery. Why not?

6. Reach Your Goals
a. Set a goal and then imagine reaching it. If you could have anything you wanted this week, this month or this year, what would you have?
b. Imaging doing the steps it would take to accomplish this goal. What would you do?
c. Imaging being the person who can do these steps. What would you be like? Imagine being this person.

7. Create Your Marriage
a. Use your imagination to find a terrific spouse. What does this person look like, act like, do, etc. Imagine all the details.
b. Use your imagination to see what he or she would want. What would YOU need to be this person’s terrific spouse. Imagine these details, as well.
c. Imagine a great marriage. See you and your spouse enjoying a wonderful relationship for the rest of your lives.

8. Partnerships and Teams
a. Use your imagination to find awesome work partners or team members.
b. What can these people do? How do they act? How do you operate together? How will you celebrate your successes?

9. Solve Problems
a. Use your imagination to calculate solutions for the future.
b. Create a detailed image of a problem and then imagine various solutions until you see one that works best (at least in your imagination).

10. Improve Your Life Skills
a. Increase your confidence. Mentally rehearse success until you feel prepared, focused and positive.
b. Pick any part of your personality you want to improve. Imagine it until you make the change.
c. Use your imagination to succeed each day. For example, while preparing to start your day, close your eyes and imagine everything you will do. Make it a wonderful day even before you start.

Three Imagination Exercises

You can use exercises like these to improve your imagination skills. As your ability to imagine improves, your success grows proportionately.

1. Practice imagining something.
a. Just create a mental picture of anything, like a cat.
b. Include details such as sounds, smells and other sensations.
c. Don’t get too serious, but make sure you have done this.
d. Repeat until this is easy for you to do.

2. Imagine a small success.
a. What do you want during the next hour. For example, you want to clean up your space or eat an awesome salad.
b. Now close your eyes and check out your senses and perceptions you get when imagining this success.
c. For example, if it’s an awesome salad:
What do you put in this salad?
What does it smell like?
When will you eat it?
What does it taste like?
How does it feel in your stomach?
d. Make the event happen. For example, clean up the space or go make the salad and eat it.
e. Did you get what you imagined? If not, repeat until you can do it every time.

3. Before you get out of bed or as you prepare for your day, imagine how it will be.
a. Create and watch a movie of you going through your day. Make it a great movie!
b. At the end of the day, see how close you got to your movie.
c. Repeat until you can imagine a great day and make it happen every time.

Three Recommendations

1. Pick one of the “Ten Ways to Succeed with Your Imagination” above.

2. Write a short story of you making this happen. Write it as if it’s happening right now.
a. For example, you want to invent something spectacular. Start your story with “I see myself inventing a…”
b. Make your story as vivid as you like.
What does this success feel like?
Look like?
Smell like?
Sound like?
Taste like?
Where are you?
What is your mood like?
What are you being?
What are you doing?
What do you love about it?
What will you do after you reach it?
c. Write your plan at the bottom of the story.
d. Take the first step toward this success.

3. Take your imagination to the next level.
Push yourself to imagine things beyond what seems likely or real. Ask yourself,
“What else could be possible?”
“What incredible success might I actually have?”
“What is the most amazing success possible?”

Write a story about your success and make your plan.

If you can imagine it, you can do it!

Next, read “The Power of Your Imagination.”

Check out this new “Self Analysis Home Study Kit.”