Key Messages
4 Ways Perception Can Unlock Productivity And Grow Your Business: A Guide To Visualization Strategies
Our eyes may be deceiving us and giving us an incomplete perception of reality.
However, we can use this deception to our advantage by understanding the gap between visual perception and reality, reframing our perception, and using four powerful visualization strategies to confront our challenges and reach our goals.
High achievers have perfected the art of using their eyes in conjunction with their brains, allowing them to look at obstacles from a new perspective and develop creative solutions.
With these skills, they normalize failure without being deterred from achieving what they set out to do.
With practice and a few savvy hacks, you too can harness the power of your eyes to tackle any challenge or goal that comes your way.
Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise: having the right vision and problem-solving attitude is key to making it happen!
Having The Right Visualization Strategies Can Help You Achieve Your Goals
Narrowing the focus of your visual attention is a proven strategy for reaching your goals more effectively.
Joan Benoit Samuelson, the first-ever female Olympic marathon champion, employed this approach to succeed in her race—instead of running the entire 26.2 miles, she simply made it a point to pass the runner ahead of her, picking one runner at a time and only focusing on them until she had passed them.
This same principle is applicable to other long-term goals as well.
In one experiment conducted by a research team led by professor named Joan Benoit Samuelson, they found that those who focused solely on their finish line estimated it was 30% closer than the group who allowed themselves to look around and get sidetracked by their surroundings.
The narrow focus group also used 17% less effort and got there 23% quicker!
The benefits of this narrow focus can extend into other aspects of your life too—e.g., financial planning for retirement savings.
An experiment conducted by social psychologist Hal Hershfield demonstrated that when young people were presented with visualizations made from aged photos of themselves, they planned to set aside 7.2 percent of their current salary for retirement; Whereas when seeing photos of their current selves, they only set aside 4.4 percent.
The Key To Achieving Your Goals: Learn To Materialize And Execute Them
The first step to achieving any kind of success or goal you want to set out for yourself is to make sure that it is properly materialized.
This means understanding the criteria or destination that would mean success, and visualizing a concrete plan of how you can get there.
Triple Olympic swimming champion Gary Hall Sr was able to achieve success by understanding his goals and writing down his targets on a kickboard every day during practice so he knew exactly where wanted to go.
It’s also important to focus on visualizing your course of action as opposed to the outcome when trying to materialize what success looks like for you.
Studies have shown that students who focused more time on identifying the actions they needed take in order to prepare for their exam tended to study more, resulting in better results than those who just imagined getting a high grade but didn’t actually put in any preparation.
Lastly, it’s important to accept that things may not always go according to plan, and be willing to embrace mistakes along the way.
Corporate companies like Tata Group now have awards that recognize audacious attempts that fail – promoting a culture of making mistakes without shame and encouraging employees push themselves beyond their comfort zones with confidence, anticipation and preparation.
Making Yourself Accountable And Visualizing Progress Are Keys To Achieving Your Goals
Achieving any goal isn’t easy, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible either.
In fact, if you want to make sure that you reach your goals, the first step is to hold yourself accountable for your actions and efforts.
The iconic phrase “No pain, no gain” became popular in the 1980s when Jane Fonda began encouraging people to push harder during exercise.
With enough effort and dedication, great results can be achieved!
Mike Lee discovered this when he hired a trainer and was given a book that listed all the nutrition values of various foods and a small pad so he could track his calorie count each day.
This practice proved two times more successful than those who didn’t write down their intake at all.
Additionally, Lee developed an online version of this tracking system which later went on to be bought for $475 million by Under Armour as My Fitness Pal App.
Carrie Smith Nicholson is another prime example of goal success through accountability and visualizing progress.
After being newly divorced with debts totalling up to 1/3rd of her salary, Nicholson successfully paid off with entire debt within 14 months – all thanks to an online payment plan calculator she used to visually track her progress.
Contrary to popular belief, keeping yourself accountable for what you do helps ensure greater chances for future successes – whether it’s losing weight or paying off debts!
So give yourself a pat on the back next time you take the extra step of holding yourself accountable and materializing your goals along the way — eventually leading you one step closer towards reaching them!
The Power Of Sight: How Your Environment Influences Your Goals And Decisions
Staying focused on what matters can be difficult in this day and age.
With so much vying for our attention, it’s easy to get lost and find yourself off-track when pursuing your goals.
That’s why it’s important to know where to direct your attention.
As highlighted by one example from the book Clearer, Closer, Better, even members of the U.S Congress are familiar with this technique.
They realize that a seat in the line of sight of the presiding officer gives them access to a better chance at being heard during proceedings.
Similarly, retail giants such as Walmart have found success by placing products customers didn’t plan on buying within their line of sight in order to encourage them to make purchases they wouldn’t have otherwise made.
The Power Of Emotional Literacy: Reading The Messages Behind Facial Expressions
The ability to accurately read the emotional expressions of others, even if they are not wholly positive, is key to developing greater emotional intelligence and finding success in life.
A study of over 400 people in the United States showed that 95% of participants believed having a positive outlook was necessary for success.
Unfortunately, this doesn’t guarantee better performance or better grades in school.
In fact, receiving too much undeserved positive feedback can have a negative effect as it may lead you to become complacent and think that there is no need for improvement.
This is why it’s so important to be able to read the subtle expressions on someone’s face even when their message may not be wholly positive.
It can help you take constructive criticism on board and learn from your mistakes quicker.
Vision scientists found that it isn’t easy being able to do this accurately – participants only recognized fear correctly half of the time, often mistaking it for surprise or disgust.
To improve your ability to understand other people’s emotions, you should focus more on their eyes as that’s usually indicative of true feelings.
You should also pay attention to how their mouth is moving as slight differences in motion can tell you a lot about what they’re feeling.
Lastly, developing a “growth mindset” will help you be more open-minded towards learning opportunities instead of shying away from potential disappointment due to fear or negative feedback.
The Key To Achieving Goals: Knowing When To Broaden And Narrow Your Focus
Making decisions that are in line with your long-term objectives isn’t always easy.
It requires looking further ahead into the future and ensuring you account for potential pitfalls or obstacles.
Narrowing your focus, as mentioned earlier, can help keep sight of your goal at hand, but broadening it is equally important.
Clearer, Closer, Better by Blaize Clement explores this idea in detail.
According to the author, if you widen your focus at just the right time – meaning taking a step back and looking longer term – then you have a better chance of making decisions which align with long-term goals.
To illustrate the point, she gives an example of her own students who kept track of their impulse purchases over two weeks.
Initially they had estimated their total expenditure to be no more than $1,600; however their actual spending ended up being about $2,400 as a result of various momentary temptations such as buying coffee on the go or indulging in snacks without taking time to prepare them beforehand.
If someone had taken an intentional pause and thought more deeply about how these little luxuries would add up financially shorter term (and ultimately detract from larger goals longer term), they may have been more adept at avoiding them altogether – thus keeping expenditures within budget while still staying focused on larger aspiration
Realizing When To Let Go Of Long-Held Goals Opens Up Opportunities For Growth And Success
Having a broad focus can help you know when to move on from achieving a goal that you had initially set your sights on.
Steve Sims proves this case perfectly.
After starting his adult life as a bricklayer, he was determined to become a stockbroker and despite facing numerous rejections, he eventually succeeded in becoming one.
After talking his way into a transfer to Hong Kong six months into his new career, he was fired three days after arriving yet still did not give up on the idea of working in finance.
By networking through doing various jobs such as being a nightclub doorman, he started organizing nightlife events and was then sought after by banks for his event planning.
It was then he successfully realised that finance may not be the best route for him, something he would have never known had he not widened his lens of what success could look like beyond just stockbroking.
Another example is Vera Wang who wanted to be an Olympic figure skater but after failing to qualify for the Olympics decided to find her passion elsewhere.
She shifted her focus onto another field that inspired her – fashion – which ultimately led her to become one of the most prominent contemporary fashion designers today!
“Adopt A Wide-Bracket Mindset To Balance Short-Term And Long-Term Benefits In Multitasking”
When it comes to achieving our long-term goals, multitasking should be avoided.
This is because studies have shown that multitasking can impair judgment and lead to decision making which could hinder our success in the future.
Thankfully, it’s possible to reduce the allure of multitasking if you have a broad focus.
A study conducted by psychologists at Swarthmore College and UCLA among dieters found that those who focused on one task made healthier decisions than those who multitasked.
The same study revealed that multitaskers generally consumed 40 percent more calories than those who focused on one task.
Having a wide-bracket mindset is the best way to avoid negatively affecting your long-term goals with impulsive decisions that seem great in the moment but ultimately have less desirable impacts down the line.
With this type of mindset, you can broaden your focus and look beyond what’s immediately obvious when it comes to decision making.
Wrap Up
The Clearer, Closer, Better book by Peter Kaplowitz offers up a summary of the major points from the sections.
The main takeaway from these chapters is this: remember that your visual perceptions are limited and strive to see the world with more successful eyes.
This means learning how to narrow or broaden your focus, materializing plans and progress, and controlling your frame of reference to make achievable goals possible.
At the end of it all, you must take time for honest reflection.
This can mean recalling mistakes or shortcomings in order to move on better than before.
By understanding where you went wrong and what you need to do differently going forward, this book will give you the motivation needed to reach bigger and better things.
