Developing Your Winner's Image
If you’re not winning in some area or facet of your life, it has nothing to do with your genes. It doesn’t have anything to do with your IQ, your GPA, your credit rating or whether you were the oldest, youngest or middle child in your family.
Winners become winners because they decide to become winners.
No one can be a winner until he or she makes a decision to be a winner. It’s not about hours of work and effort — it’s about focus. Focus on what you want to win. The part of winning starts when you create the thought in your mind.
EXERCISE #1: WHAT DO YOU REALLY WANT?
Take a few important moments right now to close your eyes and think about what you would like your life to look like. Then, complete the following:
What do you want to accomplish financially?
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What do you want to accomplish in your closest relationships?
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What do you want to accomplish in your occupation or choice of work?
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How can you build your networks, communities, or masterminds?
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What do you want to do in your free time?
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Your thinking is the first step! In your mind, you have to see it. You have to see yourself as a winner in each of these categories of life and more. Just as professional or Olympic athletes use imagery to see their end result, you, too, must be there mentally before you’re there at the finish line in physical form.
EXERCISE #2: WHERE ARE YOU PRESENTLY?
Now that you’ve written your dreams and aspirations for your life, take a few moments to quickly review your PRESENT results. This will prove a fascinating study for you, so be honest about your results but don’t allow yourself to feel badly in any way about them. More on this in a minute ...
What have you accomplished financially?
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"Your present results HAVE nothing TO DO WITH your ability to win." — DR. AGARWAL
What have you accomplished in your closest relationships?
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What are you presently accomplishing in your occupation or choice of work?
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What kind of networks, communities, or masterminds have you developed and how useful are they to you?
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What do you do in your free time?
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The present results that you have in life right now are definitely the result of the image you have of yourself right now ... but it doesn’t have to stay that way. You don’t have to settle for that. When you change your image of yourself, new results come your way.
So, let’s forget about the present facts. You have merely recorded them here as a starting point to this adventure. Now, let’s start putting your dream together.
WHAT ARE THE OUTSIDE NOISES TELLING YOU?
Throughout our lives, there will be people telling us who we are and what we can do. Too often — and usually because we don’t know any better as children — we let these “outside noises” chart our path. Your self-image was built in your subconscious mind at a very early age. The people around you created an image in your mind based on their perception: 1) how they perceived you; and 2) how they perceive themselves.
EXERCISE #3: OUTSIDE NOISES
What “outside noise” do you have in your head? Take a moment to think back to your childhood — your parents, siblings, friends, teachers, coaches, and initial employers. Then, think of people in your life right now who might be making comments on your direction or abilities. Jot a few of those remembered comments or statements of direction here below:
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It’s important that you learn to listen to your inner voice because this is the voice that KNOWS. This is your higher self. It already has the confidence that you can do whatever you desire — in fact, you wouldn’t have been allowed to dream up the desire if it weren’t possible to fulfill it. Winners have learned how to defer to the higher self where an image of perfection exists and continues to express itself.
EXERCISE #4: WHOSE GOAL IS THIS ANYWAY?
Winners don’t allow other people’s goals to become their goals. They’ve keyed in on the true voice — their inner voice — to prompt and direct them. With this in mind, return to the dreams and desires you wrote in Exercise #1. As you read through each one, ask yourself the following: Do I really want this for myself or am I creating this to keep someone else happy?
If you find that your goal(s) is really someone else’s goal, cross out whatever it is you’ve written and get focused. Focus on that inner voice. Then, re-write your dream for YOU in the space below:
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YOU DON'T HAVE TO KNOW HOW YOU'RE GOING TO ACHIEVE IT.
All too often, we allow ourselves to get mired down in the “HOW” a dream of ours will actually get accomplished. Remember, it’s not your job to question HOW. You don’t have to have the full plan in place. It’s your job to simply believe, see yourself as winning in full and vivid color and then . . . ACT!
"Unless you are consciously aware that you have the right to take over the control of your own life, your self image is on auto pilot." — MAXWELL MALTZ, Psycho-Cybernetics
EXERCISE #5: Now, MOVE!
Let’s return to the first exercise in this section. As you’ve learned, winners visualize their dreams and get specific on those dreams. They then make a DECISION that they deserve these winning results. And then, they take ACTION. You don’t have to know exactly how all the action pieces are going to fall into place in your behalf, but you do have to take the first step.
As you review your desires from Exercise #1, what immediate action can you take — no matter how small — to get this dream rolling into your reality?
Action for your financial goal?
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Action for your closest relationships?
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Action for your occupation or choice of work?
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Action to build your networks, communities, or masterminds?
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Action for your free time?
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EXERCISE #6: FAST FORWARD
Who do you want to be?
Project yourself forward by 5 years with your winner's self image in place and at play. What will you be achieving? What will your life look like? What will you be doing with your days, and who will you be spending time with?
Now, write these very thoughts in PRESENT tense and in concise detail, as if you've already achieved this in your life:
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Congratulations! You've written your first winner's image affirmation. This affirmation is something you want to get into the habit of reading daily.
EXERCISE #6: YOUR ACTION ON YOUR AFFIRMATION
My mentor and friend, Bob Proctor, encourages the clients he coaches to write their affirmation on a small “goal card” that they can easily carry with them, post on their bathroom mirror, or tape to the inside of their front door. You want to have this affirmation in plain view where you come across it and read it out loud daily.
To further and more quickly imbed your winner’s image, record this affirmation so that you’re listening to your own tape again and again and again.
The key here is to “re-program” what your subconscious mind has been programmed to think about you and your old image. Only by constant and reinforced repetition in your conscious mind will you be able to “lay new tracks” that finally relinquish that old programming and allow you to live and think and act with your winner’s image.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
Take personal responsibility for where you are in your life right now. Refuse to play the role of victim. Don’t beat yourself up for where you are, who you are, and what you’ve been doing — give yourself credit for taking a winner’s step in a right and positive direction! Refuse to talk about your past losses, your misfortunes, your broken relationships, etc. This sort of talk only reinforces negativity and poor self-image. You want to only talk about where you’re going, what you’re becoming, and where you’re going to be.
Then, take full responsibility for the dreams you’re beginning to develop into reality. By taking responsibility, you’re taking the first action step. You’ll find that, once you take full responsibility, your self-image will begin to operate at a different level. You will begin to see yourself in a different and warmer light. And, once you take responsibility for your results, doors of opportunity begin to open for you … just watch!
"Decide what you want. Decide what you are prepared to give up to get it. Set your mind to it. And get on with the work." — H.L. HUNT