Realistic manifestation:
Create Your Vision
In a three-part series, we interview integrative health coach Rosie Underwood about techniques for manifesting dreams into reality. Step one? Create a future vision that fills you with excitement and joy!
To look ahead to the future you want, first take a look back to the kid you once were. It just so happens that the thought patterns of children offer some interesting guidance to us adults. “When you look at a five-year-old, their forward thinking is one of imagination and creation”, Rosie observes. “As adults, we tend to lose that ability. Instead, when we look ahead we often get lost in anticipation and worry, which can quickly morph into anxiety.”
In fact, Rosie says there’s such a fine line between anxiety and excitement that physiologically the two are almost identical. While one emotion is seen as negative and the other positive, they both deliver the same effects on the body: elevated heart rate, butterflies in the stomach, an inability to keep still or focus – all symptoms simply resulting from the arousal of the nervous system.
If the difference between anxiety and excitement lies in our interpretation of them, then reframing our emotions can have a significant effect on how we live from one moment to the next. If you your future – either immediate or distant – isn’t filling you with excitement and joy, then Rosie recommends an envisaging exercise.
envisaging exercise
Write a vision of how you see your life over the course of the next year.
A written vision can be a lot more helpful than pictures because it allows you to be very, very detailed and specific with not just how it looks but how it feels to be you, living your dreams. In contrast to a vision board made up of cutout pictures, you can re-read your narrative vision whenever you like to cement it in your psyche.
1. Get detailed, specific, and descriptive.
Include areas of your primary “foods” like career, relationships, finances, spirituality, creativity, joy and so on. Dive deep and really consider what you might be doing on a typical day, who you’re with, how you’re feeling physically and emotionally.
2. Use present tense.
The idea is to write your vision as if it’s actually happening right now. Allow yourself to realistically dream big – but make it believable so your subconscious mind can relate and buy into it.
3. Remember this is a vision, not a demand.
Your written vision exists to give you a point of focus, so whenever you notice anxiety or negative anticipation emerging, use it to guide you back to the positive path. “But if the universe has other ideas for you, go with the flow”, Rosie advises. “If the parameters move, move with them. Hold this vision to your heart, but hold it loosely.”
The secret to realistic manifesting
We often hear that life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it. “This is the real secret to realistic manifesting, because if you really want to change your life, you have to change the way that you think”, Rosie says. Letting go of the old story that stokes the fire of anticipation and anxiety gives you space to create a new reality that’s fuelled by imagination and creation.
