Here’s my Monday memo:
“Overcoming obstacles is infinitely easier when you change your mental images from impossibility to probability; from there is no way to here’s the way.”
Matt Furey
Why Will Power Doesn’t Work
“In the battle between will power and imagination, will power always loses.
Will power loses because it imposes and forces its way. Imagination wins
because it creates spontaneous, natural rhythm and flow. Will power causes
resistance while imagination creates momentum.”
– Matt Furey
My best-selling product, Dao Zou, strengthens your imagination along with your body. There is no will power used whatsoever in this program. Meditatively move as you picture your goals. Breathe deeply, connect and let go. Feel the buzz of energy you’ve heard about, but never experienced.
The Good and Bad of Procrastination
Last week, one of my clients told me what he used to do when it was time to get to work on a goal he’d set for himself.
“Clean the cabinets, organize the chest of drawers, go shopping, online or offline, watch the news and so on,” he said. “Everything that isn’t important gets moved up the list because you don’t want to deal with your goal. You know you’re supposed to be working on what’s supposedly important to you, but you take a detour.”
There are, however, activities that may appear to be a form of procrastination, but they aren’t. Instead, they are opportunities to engage in creative thinking time.
My favorites are walking, power naps and a 20-minute sauna.
When I walk, my mind enters a stream of ideas, quotes, book titles, stories to tell, etcetera.
Although taking naps is often frowned on in the western world, and for no good reason, if the frowners only knew what a 15-20-minute nap does for creativity, they would make it their mandatory practice.
Sometimes, believe it or don’t, sitting in a chair doing nothing is a supreme way to organize your thoughts and realize what direction to move. I never think of it as procrastination.
And then there is practicing Theatre of the Mind, wherein you take some time once a day (or more often) to visualize and imagineer what you will be accomplishing in your life. Before you begin your day, or partway through the day, and/or at the end, you sit, relax your body, breathe deeply and picture the results you want to create.
Is Theatre of the Mind a form of procrastination?
Not at all, yet the blind may mistakenly think it is.
Taking the time to visualize the result you want to create is the most powerful practice you can engage in, yet it doesn’t appear, to the unknowing, that anything is happening.
As I wrote for my followers on Instagram – @mattfureysays – “The vast majority of peoples’ problems are mental imagery problems.”
The same is true of procrastination. If your mental image of procrastination is one in which you’re putting off the doing of what you want to be doing, you have a different outlook on the matter than someone who views what he or she is doing as creative thinking time.
Theatre of the Mind is creative thinking time. So is walking. So is napping.
Oddly enough, cleaning the chests, the cabinets, closets and drawers could be as well. But it usually isn’t because the person doing these things ISN’T picturing a goal or the steps to the goal. Instead, the person is avoiding the goal by engaging in “busywork.”
If you are stumped while working on a project, you could go for a drive and turn it into creative thinking time. You could also use the time to procrastinate. The choice is based upon how you picture what you’re doing in your mind’s eye.
If procrastination is a problem, you can begin to picture it as an opportunity to expand your thinking. First, picture a goal you want to accomplish as you supposedly procrastinate. See yourself being done with it, on the other side of it.
Sooner than you think, as you’re vacuuming or dusting, you’ll be catapulted into doing what you want to do.
You heard it here first, my friend. Turn procrastination inside out and it becomes Theatre of the Mind time.
See it. Feel it. Do it.
Matt Furey
By the way, Theatre of the Mind is available – and you can also digitally download it at audible.com
Do it.
Good Goals – Bad Goals
’twas a long, long time ago.
I was listening to an audio series in my car when I first heard the phrase. And I was stunned by the imagery that came to mind.
The self-development speaker said, “If you don’t set goals that scare you, you’re not thinking big enough.”
Set goals that SCARE you? I thought to myself. That doesn’t make any sense at all.
Over the years I’ve heard this “set goals that scare you” refrain repeated by numerous motivational speakers. I wholeheartedly disagree.
Why?
Because fear paralyzes people. When you’re afraid it’s pretty hard to take action, to truly give a task your all.
Fear causes you to move in the opposite direction of what you want.
Instead of setting goals that “scare” you, how about setting goals that EXCITE you, goals that inspire you so much you feel compelled to get up and go?
More importantly, how about setting goals that you consciously believe in?
If you consciously believe you can achieve an objective, you’re going to successfully persuade the subconscious part of your brain to believe it, too. But if you’re “scared” when you ponder your goal, you better lose the fear if you expect to get what you want.
So many people are setting goals that frighten them – and this is one of the main reasons that these same people, year after year, feel frustrated about where they are in life.
The Zero Resistance Living way of achieving goals teaches you to eliminate negative emotions from your visualization practice. You learn to set daily goals, which are the hallmark of the super achiever.
Having a 20, 10, 5 or 1-year goal only works when you are securing plenty of daily victories that create unstoppable forward momentum.
And that’s what both you and I want to see and experience.
Set daily goals that INSPIRE you and you’ll create momentum. With daily momentum, your long-term goals can be accomplished.
See it. Feel it. Be it.
Matt Furey
Become Who You Picture Yourself to Be
“When you have great intention, you become who you picture yourself to be.”
– el Furecat aka Matt Furey
How do you picture yourself when preparing to speak with your boss, wife, husband, son, daughter, friend, neighbor, etc?
In each and every scenario, you see yourself being a certain type of person. And then you act accordingly.
And this will never change unless you deliberately picture yourself in a different way – and do so with great intention.
A few days ago I consulted with a man who was preparing to meet with his boss to ask for a long overdue raise. He was nervous and fearful about the meeting.
I asked him, “How big is your mental picture of yourself when you imagine yourself in the meeting?
Answer: “Not very big.”
“And the feeling?”
“My feeling is weak. Almost lifeless,” he answered.
“How about your boss?” I queried. “How big is he in your imagination?”
“He’s HUGE,” the man replied. “He’s really big and powerful.”
“Is it any wonder that you’re feeling nervous about your meeting?”
“True,” he replied. “I’m already experiencing the side effects of what I’m imagining. Man, this sucks.”
“It sure does,” I said. “But the good news is you can change your mental imagery with a single picture that you infuse with the power of intention.”
You cannot override the mental imagery you have inside your mind with weak, lifeless, tepid emotion.
But the second you begin to understand what intention is and how it works, what you are imagining begins to take place in your life.
Imagination without intention doesn’t bring about change. Imagination with intention gives you the keys to change your life for the better.
You have the power to affect change in your circumstances. In fact, you already are affecting your circumstances. Examine your mental imagery and you’ll see the proof.
See yourself bigger and better, then stand back and observe how the seas begin to part for you.
Matt Furey
The Perfection in a Mistake
a couple quick quotes for you to think about this fine Tuesday morning:
“You are not your mistakes.” – Dr. Maxwell Maltz
“Show me your mistakes,
your setbacks and failures,
and I’ll show you the
steppingstones
and
spring boards
to a brighter
future.”
– el Furecat
That’s all for today, my friend.
See it. Feel it. Be it.
Matt Furey
P.S. There’s a lot more of the above for you to see on my Instagram page – @mattfureysays –
as well as here: Facebook.com/groups/mattfureytheatreofthemind/
Momentum
Lao Tzu – “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
Dale Carnegie: “Live in daylight compartments.”
“Live in the Now and Make ’em say Wow.” – el Furecat
Thinking small, focusing on constant, continuous, incremental improvement – making the process your goal, is hard to argue with, unless you are selling a book that promises a supposedly bigger and better approach.
Is there value in thinking big?
Yes, there is. Yet, for most people, most of the time, they are going to do far better with an incremental approach to success.
You can prove this to yourself with this example:
Suppose you’re Roger Bannister, the first person to break the 4-minute mile.
Why not think big and shoot for three minutes? Or two? Or one?
Come on, Roger, you’re limiting yourself and there are no limits.
In the world of martial arts training, which I am a part of, you don’t start off breaking breaks.
You begin with hitting something soft and gradually condition your body and your mind to do more.
Your focus is on continuous improvement – hitting small goals that are before you instead of dreaming of something HUGE that you must FORCE yourself to believe.
As you hit these small goals, over and over, you establish MOMENTUM.
This MOMENTUM then leads to a natural, organic upgrade of your beliefs.
You begin to think of yourself as unstoppable. You begin to believe you can create whatever you focus on.
When you have MOMENTUM, great things happen.
You naturally flow from one victory into another. Frustration, fear, worry and doubt are gone when you have MOMENTUM.
Get more MO and you will FLOW.
Here endeth the lesson.
Matt Furey
The Power of Gratitude
If you want to get into the FLOW and stay there….then you’ll love the new Your Tube video I put up for you.
Follow the advice in this video and you’ll be amazed at how your vibration changes – and how quickly.
The Muhammad Ali Secret
“The Greatest” had a secret for getting himself to work hard when he encountered resistance.
His own resistance.
The kind of resistance that makes you prone to procrastination and frustration. The kind of resistance that leads to NOT reaching your goals because you’re picturing the wrong images in your mind’s eye.
Ali had a way around the resistance.
When other people were out partying or sleeping and he had a fight to prepare for, Muhammad Ali told himself something that motivated him to get the job done.
Want to know what that was?
I reveal all in the following must watch YouTube clip.
After you watch this clip, make sure you subscribe to my channel as there’s a lot more coming your way.
Matt Furey
When Nothing Changes – Remember This
“The more things appear to be the same, the more they may be changing – and usually for the better.
The more things appear to be getting worse, the more they may actually be improving – for the better.
The more you see on the outside, the more you need to peak beneath the surface. The more you look within, the easier it is to get better without.”
– el Furecat
nom de plume of Matt Furey’s alter ego
