Mobius Monday Minute – June 20 , 2011
Do you dream about how good an ideal future outcome is going to be? Do you follow the typical common coach’s suggestion about visualizing yourself in the winner’s circle?
If you do you could be heading for failure.
Reams of studies put together by psychologists over the years have shown that indulging in positive fantasies actually makes people’s ambitions less likely to become reality. But no one had yet figured out why.
Until now that is.
A new study carried out by researchers at New York University’s Motivation Lab points to evidence that positive fantasies sap our energy. “By allowing people to consummate a desired future”, the researchers explain, “positive fantasies trigger the relaxation that would normally accompany actual achievement, rather than marshaling the energy needed to obtain it”.
It looks like fantasizing about successful outcomes makes the task of putting out the energy to do the hard work seem unnecessary. If success seems like a forgone conclusion then why work so hard?
Apparently, the study revealed that when the fantasizing sets in even the subjects seem to get so relaxed that even their blood pressure dropped. (Although that correlation to motivation is still being looked at.)
So, should we stress ourselves to success? Or fantasize ourselves into relaxation?
Could this be why we see so many successful people with heart problems and dreamers who are flat broke? It’s quite a serious trade-off at either end of the spectrum don’t you think?
Personally, I’ve never been much of a fan of dreaming about the future. I prefer to go with future vision. Dreaming about great tomorrows that might never come is not productive. Dreams tend to be just shinny new objects in the distance that we see through the eyes of our imagination. They often appear like a movie with lots of movement and plenty of drama. But they also change a lot from session to session.
Vision is different.
With vision all you see is one frame of the completed movie. It’s always the same each time. Solid and sustained over long periods of time.
But that’s not all.
Vision allows you to actually feel its truth… it’s absoluteness that the future will be that which has been seen. Accomplishment happens through hard work sustained over time. That takes a high state of motivation that apparently dreaming can’t call-up. Dreams may be nice things that can appear fuzzy and warm but vision is a manic steamroller on its way to the finish line.
Choose wisely.
More power to you.
