Page 143 - Marky Stein - Fearless Career Change_ The Fast Track to Success in a New Field (2004)

Setting and Reaching Enticing Goals

Goals are the places where dreams and actions meet. Pick out
the kinds of goals that motivate you and give you pleasure to think
about, and then make them materialize with your sustained and per-
sistent efforts. Success requires action!

Mental Rehearsal

Extensive research in the fields of sports, psychology, peak perfor-
mance, and medicine has proven that visualizing your goal (pic-
turing it vividly in your imagination with your eyes closed) will help
you get there that much faster and achieve it with a greater degree
of precision. Sometimes visualization is called mental rehearsal
because that’s exactly what it is—a moving picture with sound,
smell, temperature, faces, shapes, and actions all perceived from
your own viewpoint. It is as if you are actually in the scene, a part
of the picture, hearing the sounds, smelling the smells.
A visualization is something you design for yourself to help
you “rehearse” the outcomes of your goals. For example, if you’d
like to be very relaxed on your first day in your brand-new career,
you might design a mental rehearsal session for yourself that
placed you in your new office feeling very comfortable, at ease,
and confident.
If you close your eyes, you can construct this office in an ideal
way for yourself—see the furniture, windows, desk, and what’s on
your desk. You may notice that someone enters your office with a
smile on her face, and all the while you are feeling very relaxed and
confident. You might even imagine your boss saying “Good job!” at
the end of the day or someone who looks interesting inviting you
out for lunch.
You can create anything you wish in your ideal rehearsal, and
the more detailed you are—the more you see vibrant colors, hear
the qualities of people’s voices talking, really imagine how you feel
as you talk to a client or customer, and even sense the temperature
of the room you’re in—the more you are likely to feel the emotions
you’d like to feel when the real day arrives.
Professional athletes have been using this technique for
decades to make field goals, score baskets, win contests, and break
records. Consider it for yourself, and have some fun with it!
If you don’t want to make up your own rehearsal, you might buy
an audiocassette tape or CD with a prerecorded generic mental

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