Everything is hard before it becomes easy. When we try to become a positive, optimistic person, we have to overcome many difficulties till the new pattern of thinking becomes a habit. Here are the three ways Brian Tracy suggests, to develop the habit of optimism and self-confidence.
1- Positive affirmations:
We become what we think, what we talk about and say most of the time. Our brain has a default setting of negativity. If we do not think positively, the mind fills itself with negativity. So it is important to think positive and steer your mind towards positivity every time you see it drifting to negativity. Positive affirmations help in developing the habit of positivity, optimism and self confidence.
There are three Ps of positive affirmations:
Personal: Precede each command with ‘I’
Present: State the affirmation as if it is the current reality and has already happened.
Positive tense: Subconscious mind can’t process a negative command, so phrase it in positive sense e.g. “I am non-smoker” instead of “I do not smoke any more”.
2- Visualization:
It is a most powerful technique for mental programming. The more you feed your mind with a clear mental picture of the person you want to be and the results you want to achieve, the deeper these commands go into your subconscious mind, preprogramming you to think, feel and act in a certain way when required. The keys to powerful and effective visualization are:
- Vividness – the more vivid your visualization is, more quickly you will begin to bring people and resources into your life to make your visualization a reality.
- Intensity – the more emotion you can put in the visualization, the emotion that would accompany the successful realization of your desire, the greater impact it will have on your thoughts, feelings and actions.
- Duration – the longer you can hold your vivid and emotionalized picture in your mind, the faster it becomes a reality.
- Frequency – the more often you can visualize your goal, the faster it comes true.
One of the technique of visualization is Rapid Preprogramming Technique, which has 4 steps:
1- Verbalize: Think about what you want to do or the way you want to be have in an upcoming event and then state it strongly and clearly e.g. “In the upcoming presentation I will be calm, positive and in complete control”
2- Visualize: Create a clear picture of yourself behaving that way.
3- Emotionalize: Get the feeling you would have if the situation turn out exactly the same. e.g feeling of clam, happy and relax
4- Realize: After the first 3 steps allow your subconscious to work on the event until it occurs and you will be astonished that it will happen as you imagined.
3- Prepare before the Event:
Prepare and pre-program yourself in advance of an important event, so that you are mentally and emotionally prepared to function at the top of your game. Two best times of rehearsal are before sleeping at night and just after waking up in the morning, as these two times are when our subconscious is more receptive to reprogramming.
