“In order to keep their minds virtuous, the Stoics practiced something like negative visualization: They imagined the worst thing that could happen in order to be prepared if certain privileges and pleasures were taken from them.”
Héctor García and Francesc Miralles, Ikigai (Page 168)
Visualization Quotes
“What fascinates me about the character of Alexander the Great is that he seemed to see the future with such clarity and such intensity as to make it virtually impossible that it would not come true—and that he would be the one to make it so. That’s you and me at the inception of any creative project. The book/ screenplay/ nonprofit/ start-up already exists in the Other World. Your job and mine is to bring it forth in this one.”
Steven Pressfield, Put Your Ass Where Your Heart Wants To Be (Page 104)
“Using visualization, we can revisit the past, editing the narrative we tell ourselves about our history. Imagine you hated the last thing you said to a parent who passed away. Seeing yourself in your mind’s eye telling your parent how much you loved them doesn’t change the past, but, unlike nostalgia and regret, it starts the healing. And if you envision your hopes, dreams, and fears of the future, you can process feelings before they happen, strengthening yourself to take on new challenges.”
Jay Shetty, via Think Like A Monk (Page 197)
“If you envision your hopes, dreams, and fears of the future, you can process feelings before they happen, strengthening yourself to take on new challenges. Before giving a speech, I often prepare by visualizing myself going on stage to deliver it. Anything you see in the man-made world—this book, a table, a clock—whatever it is, it existed in someone’s mind before it came to be. In order to create something we have to imagine it. This is why visualization is so important. Whatever we build internally can be built externally.”
Jay Shetty, via Think Like A Monk (Page 192)
“The first step to becoming your most powerful self is to literally envision that person. Don’t take yourself out of your current context, either. Begin to ask yourself: What would the most powerful version of me do right now? What would they do with this day? How would they respond to this challenge? How would they move forward? How would they think? What would they feel?”
Brianna Wiest, The Mountain Is You (Page 184)
“Visualization will never compensate for work undone. You cannot visualize lies. All the strategies I employ to answer the simple questions and win the mind game are only effective because I put in work. It’s a lot more than mind over matter. It takes relentless self-discipline to schedule suffering into your day, every day, but if you do, you’ll find that at the other end of that suffering is a whole other life just waiting for you.” ~ David Goggins, Can’t Hurt Me
“Even though you may not feel or look the part now, you must envision yourself in your ideal state, activating your personal power and living in alignment with your stand and purpose. I learned in the SEALs that there’s no such thing as perfection, only perfect effort. Through practicing a ‘perfect’ version of ourselves mentally, we’ll slowly become that person in real life.” ~ Mark Divine, The Way of the Seal
“Talking and doing fight for the same resources. Research shows that while goal visualization is important, after a certain point our mind begins to confuse it with actual progress. The same goes for verbalization. Even talking aloud to ourselves while we work through difficult problems has been shown to significantly decrease insight and breakthroughs. After spending so much time thinking, explaining, and talking about a task, we start to feel that we’ve gotten closer to achieving it. Or worse, when things get tough, we feel we can toss the whole project aside because we’ve given it our best try, although of course we haven’t.” ~ Ryan Holiday, Ego is the Enemy
“If you can see yourself doing something, you can do it. If you can’t see yourself doing something, usually you can’t achieve it.” ~ SEAL, Living With A SEAL
“The dreamers are the saviors of the world. As the visible world is sustained by the invisible, so men, through all their trials and sins and sordid vocations, are nourished by the beautiful visions of the solitary dreamers. Humanity cannot forget its dreamers; it cannot let their ideals fade and die; it lives in them; it knows them as the realities which it shall one day see and know.” ~ James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
“No one can outperform his/her self image.” ~ Gary Mack, Mind Gym